Did You Get The Email

Tuesday's announcement that there would be no indictment regarding Clinton's email servers didn't surprise me. As I wrote a few months back: "I don't have a crystal ball, and in these strange times it seems like literally anything can happen. But that said, Hillary will not be charged, much less indicted for this email 'scandal.' She simply did not do anything outside of the boundaries of what entitled, powerful people do. She did not jeopardize national security; she did not break the law. There is no conspiracy to protect her and her interests. In spite of four years of investigating Benghazi, and dozens of hours of testimony from countless people regarding this 'scandal,' no evidence of wrongdoing has been found. And I doubt there will be." I'm pleased to be vindicated, even though I was very far from the only person to make such a prediction.

I work for a large financial institution. It might be hard for younger folks to believe, but when I started here in 2001, which really isn't so long ago, executives didn't even use email -- they had secretaries to print out their messages. So it doesn't take much for me to believe that, just as smart phones were starting to become a thing, a not-very-tech-savvy, boomer-aged executive took the advice of the first person who came along and said she could keep her BlackBerry. Basically, she wanted a productivity tool for her job, and her employer could not or would not provide it, so she got it set up for herself. That is the beginning and end of this story.

It should be noted: Clinton didn't hide this! She used it openly and with the apparent knowledge (and expressed concern) of all relevant parties. So is it even bending the rules if she's doing it with the knowledge and without the sanction of the parties who oversee electronic security for the State Department? Hell, I don't know. IANAL, YMMV. But I didn't think so, and since the FBI has now confirmed that no laws were broken, at this point I really do not care.

Moreover, yesterday the State Department seemed to contradict Comey's and the FBI's contention that any classified material was sent:

MR KIRBY: Generally speaking, there's a standard process for developing call sheets for the secretary of state. Call sheets are often marked -- it's not untypical at all for them to be marked at the confidential level -- prior to a decision by the secretary that he or she will make that call. Oftentimes, once it is clear that the secretary intends to make a call, the department will then consider the call sheet SBU, sensitive but unclassified, or unclassified altogether, and then mark it appropriately and prepare it for the secretary's use in actually making the call. The classification of a call sheet therefore is not necessarily fixed in time, and staffers in the secretary's office who are involved in preparing and finalizing these call sheets, they understand that. Given this context, it appears the markings in the documents raised in the media report were no longer necessary or appropriate at the time that they were sent as an actual email. So it appears that those --

QUESTION: That the calls were already made?

MR KIRBY: -- no -- that those markings were a human error. They didn't need to be there. Because once the secretary had decided to make the call, the process is then to move the call sheet, to change its markings to unclassified and deliver it to the secretary in a form that he or she can use. And best we can tell on these occasions, the markings – the confidential markings – was simply human error. Because the decision had already been made, they didn't need to be made on the email.

(Emphasis mine.)

So what we have is yet another ginned up controversy. And that's what troubles me: this is another red herring nurtured by her political enemies. Sure: make a case that she's entitled. Make the case that she is loose with standards and regulations and with national security. But whispered notions of conspiracies and a 'rigged system' undermine your argument.

ETA: here is a good piece that further explains why this case is mostly nonsense.

Random Thought of the Day

I'm puzzled how "social justice warrior" and "SJW" ever became pejoratives. Who except a sociopath would think that fighting for social justice is a bad thing?

Awakened, As If By The Force

Note: this was written way back on 12/19/2015. Not sure why I never published it. Probably because it was incomplete and not very interesting. 

Thursday evening, I noticed that Star Wars: The Force Awakens was playing everywhere already. Huh? Didn't it have a release date of Friday the 18th? And don't these kinds of premieres happen at midnight?

Since my days of seeing midnight shows are long behind me, I had paid little attention -- I planned to see it early the following week. But the idea of seeing a 9 or 10 PM show on opening night sounded do-able, tickets were available, and I was suddenly seized with the urge to see it right away. I sent a text message to a friend to see if he wanted to catch it, but I didn't hear back. Discouraged, I went to bed early. But I hadn't killed the impulse -- I thought to myself, "well, it's playing all night long, pretty much every hour. Maybe if I wake up in the middle of the night, I'll catch an early show before work."

Friday, I woke up at about 3:15 AM and went to the bathroom. It was decided - the desire to see this movie was gnawing at me, and I wasn't going to be able to get back to sleep. So I pulled on my pants and drove to the mall to clock in at the 4:00 AM show. Good call! There were like, 5 other people in the theater. I even answered a Star Wars trivia question and won a surprisingly nice Darth Vader bathrobe. Score!

So, much of what I said in my "pre-review" below was right: the film had a great set of diverse and interesting new characters played by charismatic young actors, the production design and action was strong, and the film had a brisk pace and style. The biggest letdown was that it is essentially a remake of the first two Star Wars movies. But the film was infused with some emotional resonance that came from an unexpected source in the main villain. In the end, it mirrored the best of its predecessors: it was an entertaining popcorn movie.

Sometimes...

Sometimes, something in the background is just something in the background...

But other times, the background is significant.

Why The New Star Wars Will Be Good

The new Star Wars movie is going to be good - like, really good. Maybe even great. At least, that is my hope and belief. My feelings are based on more than a just a fan's optimism, however. Here's why I think it will succeed where the prequel trilogy failed so miserably.



Reason One: female characters. Out of six Star Wars films to date, not one of them passed the Bechdel Test.* I don't think any of the movies save Return of the Jedi even had two named female characters with speaking parts. Along comes the latest trailer for The Force Awakens, and by itself, the opening voiceover passes this classic litmus. A small fact, to be sure, but this alone sets the new film apart from anything that's come before. I think that this is a very good sign, and I'm a big fan of stories with interesting and engaging female characters.

Reason Two: visual style. In some ways, the first Star Wars movie is the best: George Lucas was just out of film school, where he had studied luminaries like Akira Kurosawa and spent time with people who would become some of the great American directors of our time. That first film reflects an almost silent-movie ethic, in which the visuals and the editing are the central storytelling mechanisms. The subsequent films, however, moved away from that style of cinematic expression.

Now consider this short sequence from the trailer that gives a vignette of exploration - it is remarkably similar to Miyazaki's Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind.

It's a simple setup, but it suggests a command of visual storytelling that was sorely lacking in the prequel trilogy. And its clear parallels to an artist like Miyazaki is cause for hope and celebration.

Reason Three: real sets. As Red Letter Media so devastatingly pointed out, you simply cannot make an exciting movie with nothing but a green screen (seriously, watch four minutes of this clip). From interviews and production stills, we know that the new film will not suffer from this defect.

Reason Four: genuine loss and emotion. George Lucas has never had a gift for dialog, nor has he ever been known as an "actor's director." The best-written Star Wars film to date is Empire Strikes Back, written by Lawrence Kasdan based upon Lucas' story. In that film, Kasdan and director Irvin Kershner conjured real humanity and feeling out of the light-hearted space opera.

So having Lucas out of the picture gives an immediate boost to the prospects of the film having a good story with well-written characters. More deeply, the latest trailer has some tight, expressive dialog and voice acting that give me chills. Finally, the themes of the three The Force Awakens trailers seem to be fear and menace, family and home, and the search for a history and an identity. These are powerful and timeless themes that fit well within Joseph Campbell's Hero With A Thousand Faces. If the filmmakers can deliver on the promise, the movie could surpass all expectations.

Reason Five: insiders, and especially the actors in the film, are already fans of this movie. Of course actors are professionals who are under contract to pitch the movies in which they star. But they don't do things like this or this when they aren't excited about the results of their work.

Of course, it still could end up being terrible. But if it sucks, I'll come back here and eat crow and complain. I always do.

*UPDATE: several smart people have pointed out that A New Hope does have two named female characters (Leia and poor Aunt Beru, who I had forgotten), and that Phantom Menace and Attack of the Clones actually do pass the Bechdel test (though only just barely). I will simply point out that apart from Princess Leia, none of the female characters in the first six movies had much to do or much screen time. And with the exception of Leia, none had any character development whatsoever. So, however we score the previous films on the Bechdel test, from the trailers, The Force Awakens looks to be a big departure from the glaring lack of developed female characters in the Star Wars film franchise. Thanks to my old friend the Dutchman and to Manny Kant over at LGM for pointing out my omissions.

The Modern Conservative Movement, In One Image

Saturn Devouring His Son, Francisco Goya 

A Few Thoughts About Mass Shootings And Gun Violence

1. I am not 'scared' of a mass shooting any more than I'm 'scared' of being struck by lightning or 'scared' of being hit by a car. I want to do something about mass shootings (and other gun deaths) because they are preventable and tragic and unnecessary.

 2. Jeb Bush made a good point when he said, "stuff happens, there's always a crisis. And the impulse is always to do something, and it's not necessarily the right thing to do." That's a fair quote, but he's being attacked for the first part and not the second, which is unfortunate. The problem with what he said is that in fact, we know that good, effect policies exist that can and have effectively addressed the problem of mass shootings and other gun violence. Doing nothing is only a tenable position if there is nothing more that can be done. That's not the case with gun laws to address gun violence.

3. I have a difficult time understanding people like NRA president Wayne LaPierre, neurosurgeon-cum-presidential candidate Ben Carson, Tennessee Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey, and Douglas County, Oregon Sheriff John Hanlin, who call for more guns in the wake of a gun-slaughter. It strikes me as an extreme form of fear-mongering. "Better get a weapon or next time, they'll get you."

4. But more basically, haven't any of the above heard of friendly-fire? Have they not seen the myriad stories about accidental shootings? My only answer to these questions is "yes, they absolutely have." Which means that they are disregarding their own answers to these questions because a) they are pandering to gun-culture, b) they believe that the blood of innocents is a price that must be paid, or c) both. All of which are personally appalling.

5. Blocking funding to study the problem of gun violence is a particularly grotesque form of cowardice.

6. My last thought: the conversation about guns always seems to drift into the need for personal security. To me, genuine security looks like this:

And not like this:

This:

And definitely not this: