Sentences that should've been rephrased

Christine O'Donnell walked off the set of her interview with Piers Morgan after he probed her

Nothing to see here, folks, move along, step lively

So it seems that this 18-year-old girl in Australia was found with what was purported to be a "booby trap" type of device around her neck. After the police force, working with experts, were able to remove the collar, it was found to have been a hoax.

Now...I will not voice any suspicions at this time as to whether the young lady's tale of how she got into the collar was the truth.

But I'm not the only one who, on seeing this story, was reminded of a certain third film in the thrilling (mostly) Saw series.

The terror echoes the plot of the 2006 horror movie Saw III in which a madman fits a collar of shotgun cartridges round a pretty victim's neck.

Technically, a madwoman fits the shotgun cartridges round her neck.

More interestingly:

Prime Minister Julia Gillard has likened the ordeal to "a Hollywood script". She said it's "the kind of thing you would see at the cinema or on TV. You would never expect it to happen in real life in Australia".

Well, yeah...if you forget that Saw was created and Saw III was written by two Australians (Leigh Whannell and James Wan).

Let's not be so quick to blame Hollywood for the mad things in art that mad people try to make live, m'kay?

Why would she do this to me, that's all.

I just want to know why she'd do this to me. Why would who do what?

Why would Jane Wiedlin, at whose hotness I once fell at her feet.



Why would she sacrifice her signature Joan of Arc cut to go bleach blonde?

Why, that's all.

So go figure.

In the first 10 minutes of this WTF with Marc Maron podcast, Maron reads some e-mails. One of them is from me. He doesn't read my name--although oddly, one of the others whose name he does read (bastard) is Ben, too.

Whether by process of elimination or because you recognize my style, you'll probably know which one is mine, should you care to listen.

Again indulging that occasional habit of Amazon reviewing

Talking to Girls About Duran Duran, by Rob Sheffield.

It's time for the annual try

And now, four completely unrelated matters.

1. Tuesday, September First, will be my birthday.

2. iTunes sells gift certificates; I have a Wish List there.

3. I also have an Amazon Wishlist.

4. All together, every single Saw movie on said Amazon Wishlist combined could be had for like, $16 (not including shipping).

Good day. Thank you for your time.

A New Feature

You in my vast reading audience are familiar by now with the fun I like to have with headlines. "Headlines That Should Have Been Rephrased;" "Great Headlines in Journalism," and the like.

I'm proud now to introduce a new series, which I intend to call: Headlines That Could've been a Lot Funnier, with a Little Rewriting.

Case in point:

Rick Santorum Unleashes on Rick Perry for Gay Marriage Stance

Now, if they'd just gone for the word "Unloads"...

I'm beginning to think John Boehner may not be the wisest of men

Hello. If you follow the doings in our government, you may remember this incident a few months ago:

House Speaker John Boehner (R., Ohio) said Thursday that he would not agree to another temporary extension of federal government funding at current levels, upping the stakes in the debate over federal spending.

“Read my lips: We’re going to cut spending...

Shortly thereafter he was overheard saying he couldn't believe he'd said that.

Why? Because--

The phrase “Read my lips” is rarely heard in politics since George H. W. Bush used it during the Republican National Convention in 1988 to emphasize that he wouldn’t raise taxes — something he did as president to shrink the deficit.

And breaking that promise was one of the things--not the only thing, but one of the things--that killed Bush's chances for a second term. So you can understand Boehner's disbelief.

You might think, however, that he'd have learned a lesson from that gaffe. However, back in 1984...

Bush had gotten in some trouble because he had refused categorically to rule out a tax increase in terms as adamantine as Reagan's. Bush tried to wiggle out of press conferences where this came up: "No more nit-picking. Zippity doo-dah. Now it's off to the races," was his parting shot as he sought to exit one press conference where he was being grilled.

And today...

Boehner: 'It's A Zippity-Do-Da Day!'

That's what Speaker Boehner told one of our reporters as he was walking into a meeting of his caucus a short time ago.

Now, to invite comparison with George Bush I (esp. where taxes are concerned) once might be cast as unwise. To do so twice smacks of irresponsibility. The question is: Will he go for the hat trick?

And if so, how? Will he pick a fight with a short, Greek man as Bush One did? Will he be defeated by Bill Clinton, as Bush One was? Nah. If I had to place a bet, I'd look for something in the area of describing Medicare as "socialized medicine," as Bush did all the way back in 1964.

C'mon, John. I know you can do it.

That's the funniest thing I've heard in years

"As hours pass and the uncertainty builds, I think the market is starting to price in the potential that we might not have a solution by August 2," the deadline for raising the U.S. debt limit, said Channing Smith, managing director of Capital Advisors Inc. "Confidence in our political system is beginning to fade."

Beginning to fade? Beginning?

The war in Iraq...

Bush v. Gore...

Iran/Contra...

The war in Vietnam...

Watergate...

The assassination of JFK...

And he thinks confidence in our political system is just beginning to fade?

Sheesh.

I've been dissed by the star of one of my favorite shows!

Holy shit.

Okay, quick backstory. About a month ago, MoveOn.Org ran a clip from the Roseanne show under the headline,

What If Everyone Understood Today What Roseanne Understood Then?

Good clip, right? I agree. However--I freely admit--I get a little twitchy when I think writers aren't being given proper credit. So I did some quick searching and then made this comment on the Facebook version of the MoveOn post--

I think you mean what if everyone understood today what Jeff Abugov, Joel Madison and Ron Nelson knew then. They're the ones who actually wrote the episode.

--and then I don't think I've thought about it since.

Apparently, however, a fan of Roseanne * went to her blog and asked about it, saying,

Roseanne, do you know who the fuck Ben A. Varkentine is?

And lo and behold, she replied.

if you read the comments--one guy says that the three writers whose names are on the script wrote the lines, but that isn't how tv works at all--people get their names on a script according to a ledger--when it's their turn to get their names on a script--the roseanne show was written by at least fifteen people each script--and then I added jokes and thoughts and scenes to it and it was sent back and "gang punched up"...

Now. I'm actually aware that most TV is "gang written" and Roseanne was no exception. Thing is, not having been on the set myself, the only guide I have as to who wrote what is the credits. So did the three guys who were credited actually not write that scene? Maybe.

Did Roseanne? Funny, she doesn't say so. But after all, she delivered the lines (and did a good job) and the show was named after her. It appears that she would like us to infer that we might as well assume she wrote them all.

Certainly she doesn't name any other writer or writers who might be responsible, either. It's also worth noting that her relationship with most if not all of the Roseanne writers was famously abusive and belittling.

Speaking of which. Back on her blog, she then said this...

--so this guy ben k.v. who thinks he knows something --quite simply knows nothing.

Well. The easy shot is that I do at least know that my latter two initials are A & V, not K and V. But let's overlook that--she was probably in a hurry, and the name "Varkentine" has confused people better than me, you, or she. But I'm less inclined to overlook her parting shot "at" me:

Nice try though, boy--always trying to separate the woman from her work.

Well thank you, little lady, for always assuming sexism if someone doesn't like your work (or in this case, does like your work (much of it, anyway--see below), but questions whether you deserve all 100% of the credit for it).

The thing is--Roseanne is one of my favorite shows. To name just one example of why, I think the two-part story in which Roseanne's sister Jackie is beaten by her boyfriend should be a model of how to do a "very special" episode.

I think it really tried to examine, within its restrictions, the different and varying thoughts and feelings women and men have about violence. And it did so while remaining really funny, but without resorting to a compulsive need to "lighten" a very dark subject.

I think the Conners showed better than 97% of other sitcoms what a real American family was like in the '90s. ...up to a certain point.

(I mark the disintegration as beginning with the arrival of the not-Becky. Nothing against Sarah Chalke--as she would go on to show on Scrubs, she's a talented actress--but that's where the show's fictional reality began to thin, until it was finally torn up completely. By the time of the ending, oh god was it waiting to die.)

I have no problem acknowledging that Roseanne probably deserves the queen's share of the credit for why the show was so good, when it was so good. Characters like Roseanne, Dan and Darlene Conner had rarely if ever been shown before on television.

However, I think she deserves the queen's share of the credit. Not all of it. And I also think she deserves at least as much blame for why when the show got bad, it got so bad. In that regard, I suppose I should just be grateful that Roseanne didn't see these thoughts of mine on the series, written a few years ago:

It's ironic, but I really think you can trace the decline of this show by how much power Roseanne had over her character.

In the first years, Roseanne Conner is a strong, funny, loving woman. At the end, she's controlling, grim, and hateful.

Or that I said that the "real" her irritated me (and that was before all this!).

Then she might really have gotten angry.

And if that doesn't just say it all.

With pressure mounting on Congress and the White House to ensure the government doesn't default on its debt, the latest Democratic offering shows just how much party leaders have compromised during the negotiations as Republicans have held their ground. For weeks, Democrats demanded that any substantial package include revenues to offset spending cuts, namely by closing corporate tax loopholes and ending subsidies for the oil and gas industry. But their demands have now been whittled away to a proposal coming from their own party with major cuts and no revenue at all.

Republicans, meanwhile, have largely gotten what they wanted in their push for significant spending cuts without new revenue.

I ask for your forgiveness in advance

Just reading an article about the killings in Norway today. And I want to be clear that I'm as horrified by the thought of them as I hope every reasonable person would be. So I don't mean to make light, rather to take some solace in dark humor, when I say that this sentence from the story jumped out at me.

See if you can tell why.

"I saw many dead people," said Elise, whose father, Vidar Myhre, didn't want her to disclose her last name.

Sigh. Laugh, clown, laugh...

A choice of replies

Paris Hilton storms off TV interview after being called a has-been

1. Don't you have to have once been something in order to be a has-been?

Or...

2. To be fair, Paris still can wear clothes, help cause the failure of movies (some of which should've done better) and be at least two different kinds of whore. That's not a has-been at all, that's all she's ever been.

Thank you.

They couldn't have just turned on a TV, I suppose. (Edited w/addition)

I'm not saying journalism all over the world has other problems than the Murdochs...but I did just notice something. If you read news items of the father and son testimony today, you'll see that in some of them, Murdoch, Sr, tells the committee, "This is the most humble day of my life."

But in others, it was "...the most humble day of my career." Well really, how hard is that? We're talking about testimony which is being televised (live) on a multiplicity of stations around the world. And they can't get right words he spoke less than two hours before?

ETA: On the other hand, Murdoch later claimed that he wasn't sure whether or not he'd said the arrested ex-employee Rebekah Brooks was his "priority." (He's been so quoted by low-profile outlets like the BBC. )

Why isn't he sure, he says? Because there were "about 20 microphones stuck in my mouth" at the time. As if the number of devices that convert sound into electronic signal in front of one's mouth at any given time have any effect on what comes out of that mouth, or memory of same.

Even granting that might be true of you or I, or any so-called "regular people," it doesn't fly when we're talking about someone who has been an influential media mogul for more than 30 years.

You're telling me he doesn't know exactly what he's saying to that self-same media at any given time, no matter how many microphones are in front of him? Well. This is another one of those problems.

Either he knows perfectly well and is lying about it, which doesn't say much for his ethics, or he truly doesn't remember something he said less than two weeks ago, which doesn't say much for his faculties.

See, this is how you know you've crossed some sort of a line.

If You Offer To Masturbate For Her, Sophie Monk WILL Get In Touch With You.

Appeals to the public? I wouldn't be so sure of that...

There's an old saying. I've seen it attributed to Mahatma Gandhi, and I've seen it attributed to a "French radical." It may even be apocryphal. But it goes like this:

"There they go. I must run, and catch up with them--for I am their leader!"

For some reason, that old saying popped into my head just now when I saw this headline on the Yahoo! main page:

Obama appeals to public to help influence debt-ceiling deal

Oh. Really. Now Obama appeals to the public. The public that has been screaming into the wilderness (for months, at least) that they don't want anything to happen to Social Security, and they do want the wealthy people of this country to pay their share.

(Seriously, the numbers are pretty overwhelming for both).

Now Obama appeals to the public, after wasting so much time trying to make deals with people who are actively working for his defeat, and clearly don't care if everybody from the middle class on down goes with him.

Great.

How many times will the republicans have to keep pissing in his mouth before he'll stop calling it lemonade?

Gracious. Don't tell me I offend.

Got a nice note from a fella screennamed "joe_h," who informs me that

You have suckass taste in women.

This is in reaction to an old post here in which I responded to Esquire's naming Kate Beckinsale "The sexiest woman alive."

My correspondent further goes on to say that:

None of the women you named should even be mentioned in the same breath with Kate Beckinsale.

For the record, the other women I named in that old post: Anna Faris, Lauren Graham; Rosamund Pike, Megan Mullally, Bebe Neuwirth, Megan Aniston and Jennifer Fox (or sumthin), Amanda Seyfried and Amy Sedaris.

Now, this was almost two years ago. It is a fact of life that sexy does not always age well.

I'm not sure I'd name them all again now, except maybe Aniston, and I'd probably add Rosario Dawson.

But to say that none of them should be mentioned in the same breath? Is he serious? I'll say he's serious:

The fact that Kate doesn't ring your bell means you are either blind or a fag.

Oh, like there's no chance I could be both?

Sorry. I freely admit Beckinsale does have a certain something (although that something isn't picking good movie roles), but I still don't think she's all that.

...you had to be slapped down for your awful and wrong post.

Consider me slapped!

Oh, no no no no no no no no no...

Mars Needs Moms didn't fall flat soon enough to stop this future eyesore from being made.

Spielberg doesn't understand animation much better than his friend Zemeckis does--he made a movie out of The Flintstones, for crying out loud. To say nothing of An American Tail (and believe me, I'd rather say nothing of An American Tail).

But then motion capture, as we've discussed but as I am going to keep repeating until I've wrung the nausea that it causes from my body, is not animation. Any more than moving corpses around on sticks is acting.

To coin a phrase: This is obviously some new usage of the word "responsibility" I wasn't previously aware of

Orrin Hatch: The 'Poor' Should Do More To Shrink Debt, Not The Rich

"I hear how they're so caring for the poor and so forth," Hatch said in remarks on the Senate floor Wednesday, in reference to Democrats. "The poor need jobs! And they also need to share some of the responsibility."

Responsibility, Senator? A variation on the word Responsible. The word Responsible:

1.
answerable or accountable, as for something within one's power, control, or management (often followed by to or for ): He is responsible to the president for his decisions.

or

3.
chargeable with being the author, cause, or occasion of something (usually followed by for ): Termites were responsible for the damage.

Who's responsible for the high deficit, Senator? Who added five trillion to our national debt?

Don't talk to me about responsibility, Senator. In fact don't talk about it at all, to anyone. It doesn't become you to use words you so clearly know nothing about.

I'd like to start a rumor--tee hee--that Demi Moore's daughter's real father is Tom Bailey of the Thompson Twins