Popular show that escaped me

The Guardian notes something that surprises me: 

The most watched show on US Netflix, by a huge margin, is the US version of The Office. Even though the platform pumps out an absurd amount of original programming – 1,500 hours last year – it turns out that everyone just wants to watch a decade-old sitcom. One report last year said that The Office accounts for 7% all US Netflix viewing.

My confession:  I have tried watching a few episodes, and my son sometimes likes to watch it, but it's just not a show that I find has much appeal to me.  

I assume it's meant to be a bit less intensely cringe inducing than the UK version (of which I'm not sure I've even seen a full episode - I really do not warm to Ricky Gervais, although I did find some episodes of Extras pretty good.)  In a way, I find it hard to put my finger on why I don't much care for it:  I think I find the scenarios are still too much straining for humour?   So I am surprised that it's a really lingering success in the US.  C'est la vie.

And suddenly, he didn't like it

I never came back to say what I ended up thinking about the Good Omens mini series.

I thought it remained pretty amusing and very watchable all the way through.  In fact, it was one of few streaming shows that I wanted to binge watch, rather than spreading out the enjoyment as I usually do, as it did play more as a 6 hour movie than a mini series.   David Tennant was very good, but in a way I was more won over by the prissy angel act of Michael Sheen.  It did, from memory, vary from the book a fair way towards the end, and the resolution to the problem of how to prevent  Armageddon was not all that convincing: but nor was it in the book, really.  

Which brings me to a review in the Catholic Herald which is a little odd: 

Good Omens is a travesty of eschatology

Given who wrote the book, that's hardly surprising, is it?

Anyway, what's odd is that the reviewer seems to have enjoyed most of the show quite a lot, but then suddenly turned against it on something like theological grounds.  This is his last paragraph:

David Tennant is marvellous as Crowley; the scenes of him disguised as Mary Poppins and later of his talking to his plants are priceless. Michael Sheen’s Aziraphale seems too dense and simpering, but one gets used to him; he is, after all, a gay angel. As for Gaiman’s travesty of eschatology, best to take it as just another excrescence of trendy atheism: stupid and ultimately risible. 

On the "gay" point:  I'm pretty sure the book (again, this is going back to memory of one reading in the early 1990's) says that Aziraphale was frequently mistaken as gay, given the way he spoke and that he liked to dance in uninhibited fashion; but in fact his lack of genitalia would have shown people their mistake.   There's no disputing, though, that the series does play up the relationship between Crowley and Arizaphale as looking like a rom-com about unfulfilled gay longing.  (Were they mistaken as a gay couple in the book?  I see one review that says so, but I don't recall.)   Anyway, I don't know there is any evidence in the series that Arizaphale is capable of, or wanting to, act on his enjoyment of  his friend's company in any physical sense, just as in the book.  And the final scene of them enjoying lunch was pretty charming. 

So it didn't bother me, and I would be happy to see another series about their adventures, if a good enough story could be found.   I do get the feeling the series has been a hit - there is a lot of fondness for it being expressed on the 'net.

Conservative Party analysis

I like the title:

How the Tories became a Brexit death cult in thrall to Boris Johnson

The article goes on to explain that it appears something like branch stacking (party stacking?) appears to be the explanation as to why the Conservative Party rank and file have decided that Brexit is worth anything:

Surveys can’t confirm whether this so-called Blukip phenomenon is as real as some of the self-styled victims of it, such as Anna Soubry, have alleged. But what they do seem to show is that well over a third of the current Conservative Party membership joined after the 2016 referendum, which some will take as at least circumstantial evidence and may explain why they care more about Brexit than their party’s long-term survival.

What they also show is that, while no deal wins the support of “only” 60 per cent of those members who had already joined the party by the 2015 election, that figure rises to 70 per cent for those who joined after the 2016 referendum, and to an astonishing 77 per cent of those who became Conservative Party members after the 2017 general election.

In short, attitudes on Europe have hardened among rank-and-file Tories; but part of that hardening is due to the fact that some of those with less strident views on the issue may have left the party only to be replaced by Brexiteer-ultras. That, of course, is democracy. But it’s also bloody good news for Boris Johnson – at least until he risks, as prime minister, having to disillusion and disappoint them.

 

The never ending defence budget spend

On a more serious note, have a read of this really good article at New York Review of Books about the ridiculousness of the American defence budget.  

It starts with one anecdote - how many military bands of full time musicians do you think they have?   Answer:  136, with 6,500 personnel, costing $500 million a year.   (It also says the Pentagon has a 4.5 billion dollar "public affairs" budget.)  A 2016 review ended up deciding the band should stay at current levels.

It also notes that the Army has been wanting to stop buying new tanks, as a basically obsolete platform, for years, but Congress doesn't listen.  They have 6,000 of them anyway.

You know how they say that if America didn't have such a high imprisonment rate, its unemployment rate would be closer to other countries?  I always wonder what the rate would be if it had a more normal sized defence force, too.

My Rules for Life (updated)

I thought I was heading faster towards 12, but I'm disappointed to see I had only achieved 3.    But there is another one that occurred to me this morning, so the list is now up to 4:

1.  Always carry a clean, ironed handkerchief in your pocket.  Always.
2.  Never buy into timeshare apartments or holiday schemes.
3.  If you have a choice, buy the washing machine with a 15 minute "fast wash" option.

and, ta-dah:

4.  Always buy reverseable belts. (You know, usually black on one side and brown on the other.)

Comics knowledge expanded

Hey, I don't think I knew this before: 

The Gay Ghost (later renamed the Grim Ghost, not to be confused with Grim Ghost) is a fictional superhero in the DC Comics universe whose first appearance was in Sensation Comics #1 (Jan. 1942), published by one DC's predecessor companies, All-American Publications. He was created by writer Gardner Fox and artist Howard Purcell.

A little further Googling in image search brings up some amusing, hardly gay at all, results:

and now I see Cracked did have an article in 2013 that listed him as one of the 5 most absurd superheros, with this quote noted:

As for cringe-y dialogue:

 and this:

I am, verily, amused.

Frankenstein disappoints

The second series of The Frankenstein Chronicles was really quite bad.  Very badly written with nothing explained clearly; too many protagonists with sideburns who looked so alike it was hard to remember who was who; a very silly conspiracy; overly gruesome in some of its violence; and things hinted at still left unexplained at the end.  In fact, I wondered if there was a budget problem that meant a longer series that was originally written had to be compressed down into 6 episodes, abandoning much needed exposition.   

Quite disappointing after the pretty pleasing first season.

Not encouraging from Boeing

From the BBC:

US regulators have uncovered a possible new flaw in Boeing's troubled 737 Max aircraft that is likely to push back test flights.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said it identified the "potential risk" during simulator tests, but did not reveal specific details.

Another very stable genius

Gee, Boris is very, very Trump like in his inconsistency:

Boris Johnson has said the chances of a no-deal Brexit are a “million-to-one against”, despite promising to leave on 31 October whether or not he has managed to strike a new agreement with the European Union.

Johnson, the frontrunner to be prime minister, told a hustings that the chances of a no-deal Brexit were vanishingly small, as he believed there was a mood in the EU and among MPs to pass a new Brexit deal.

“It is absolutely vital that we prepare for a no-deal Brexit if we are going to get a deal,” he said. “But I don’t think that is where we are going to end up – I think it is a million-to-one against – but it is vital that we prepare.”

I also saw on TV last night his interview in which he explained his alleged hobby of making buses from cartons - it was very, very bizarre.  Many people on twitter think he was making it up (for what possible motivation, though?) and one wit said that some flunky who works for him was probably working all night creating some to prove it's not a weird jape. 

A detailed look at whether perovskite solar cells will really make a difference

Interesting article at Nature about this - seems remarkably uncertain whether the boosters of this new form of solar cell will win out.

A perfectly normal hobby for a politician

The only explanation I can see for disclosing this is that Boris really believes that the more eccentric he paints himself, the more people will overlook his lies and inadequacies:

Boris Johnson revealed that he makes buses out of old wine crates to relax.

He says he likes to unwind by painting passengers enjoying themselves on his model vehicles.

The former mayor of London, whose term in office included the introduction of a new 'Boris' bus to the capital's streets, was speaking to TalkRadio.

When no one answers an argument

What with Gillian Triggs coming out and (apparently - I have only seen extracts) making some dubious broad brush statements yesterday about religious beliefs and employment, I note that no one in my last thread about the Folau controversy has answered this point.   So let's bump it up to a post.

Who really thinks that those who are painting this as a right to religious expression would be donating money if it were this:   an Islamic sportsman with a high profile and social media accounts who used them to support things that he argues as a conservative Muslim are genuinely, religiously justified positions with plenty of tradition behind them, such as:  it would be fair enough for the law to allow for gays to be stoned to death - such a scare would help some save their souls from Hell;  that the death penalty for Muslim apostasy is warranted; that physical chastisement of a wife can be warranted and reasonable; child marriage isn't a big deal.

The obvious point is this:  some religiously justified beliefs are readily capable of holding reasonable offence for small or large parts of a modern Western society.   A company engaged in a business which wants broad support from its society should generally not have the right to discriminate on the grounds of an employees personal beliefs expressed in the private sphere, but are culture war warriors really trying to tell me that they think my hypothetical Muslim sportsman should also be free to express all his religiously justified beliefs in the public sphere via social media and it would not risk tarnishing the image of the sport that is employing him?     

Those who are defending Folau on this are simply drawing the line, as it suits their prejudice and background, as to where offensiveness in relation to religious statements about homosexuality should lie.

And yes, I know there are plenty of gay folk who go out of their way to find offence, in an irritating manner too, and most are not concerned that conservative Christians are right about their destination in the afterlife.    But nor do I dismiss the fact that Christian (indeed, even Catholic) statements about the inherently disordered nature of homosexuality can cause some angst to the self image of people (mainly young people) worried about their sexuality, especially if they come from a conservative  background.  

I therefore do not consider it unreasonable that, in these circumstances, a sporting body require that its generously paid players not engage in religiously motivated conservative commentary about the nature of homosexuality in the public sphere.   As I understand it, Folau had been warned along those lines too before signing his current contract, but he chose to do so anyway.

This means it is a contractual matter, and he may or may not win on the contractual merits.   He should not win on the wrong headed grounds that it should be open slather for any sportsman to be able to express any view under cloak of religious freedom.

PS:   I also think quite a few sports and companies are over-compensating on the matter of support for gay folk.  I would really like it if we could move past gay pride weeks and events, and find much of the public demonstration that is "pro diversity" to be an embarrassment, with gay pride parades frequently featuring fetishes, for example.   I am in no way "all in" with support for the state of gay social politics as it is currently in society.   But none of that changes my view on the Folau matter.

A funny Creighton column

Adam Creighton has decided that the big tech companies (Google, Facebook etc) companies have too much power.  He's particularly concerned that they have drained traditional news media of advertising money (true), so much so that he's willing to contemplate direct government subsidy of the news.  

Well, you might think, isn't that what we get with the ABC?   No, that's not enough:

Publicly funded media organisations can’t do as good a job. Private media companies have a powerful incentive to dig out bad news, even if it upsets governments, because it sells.

Huh? I thought Adam's paper has been complaining about the ABC "digging out bad news" (when it is about a Coalition government in power, anyway) for decades, which kinda proves public broadcasters don't have to be in the "selling" business to be interested in "bad news".

Creighton appears in The Australian - a paper for which the content over the course of a year is about 95% pure ideologically driven right wing opinion to 1% investigative journalism.  (And some of the latter is just true crime stuff - hardly matters of national political consequence.)    If he would actually come out and note that about Rupert's pet paper - as well as make some kind of observation about the heightened propaganda machine that is the money making machine known as Fox News - he might have a skerrick of credibility.

How much "investigative journalism" does Fox News engage in so as to be bring in the big money, Adam?   You know the answer - nil.   Your boss has monetised ludicrously biased spin as the way a "news" network can thrive, and you have the hide to argue that private media is better at investigative journalism.

His column goes on to complain that the big tech companies real danger is to democracy - because of the way their search filters sought out the news.   It doesn't take too much to read between the lines that his problem is that he thinks that filtering has a "left wing" bias he doesn't like - Right wingers have been complaining about search engines conspiring against them for years now.   (Because they have trouble understanding that, with the awful "we don't care about the evidence" path the Right has taken over the last 30 years, facts now have a clear Left wing bias.)

Nor does he not mention the true and clear danger from IT companies, which is via the spread of deliberate misinformation and lies (masquerading as news), sometimes via foreign governments interested in seeding political disunity, via social media.   

As usual, Adam's a just a silly lightweight who attacks all the wrong targets. 

He's dumbing you down, Jason.  

More anti Boris

A pretty savage, and somewhat amusing, attack on Boris Johnson by his old boss, Max Hastings.  I liked this line:

Like many showy personalities, he is of weak character. I recently suggested to a radio audience that he supposes himself to be Winston Churchill, while in reality being closer to Alan Partridge.

and this:

Johnson would not recognise truth, whether about his private or political life, if confronted by it in an identity parade. In a commonplace book the other day, I came across an observation made in 1750 by a contemporary savant, Bishop Berkeley: “It is impossible that a man who is false to his friends and neighbours should be true to the public.” Almost the only people who think Johnson a nice guy are those who do not know him.

More Libra scepticism

At The Conversation.

Rugby culture wars

I'm pretty amused at the Right wing culture war outrage about GoFundMe deciding after a few days that it doesn't want to be the conduit for wingnutty people with too much money to fund the legal fees for a guy who has been earning millions for running around a football field.

They now want Folau to sue GoFundMe! 

As with donations to the IPA, this latest story is another example of how wingnutty people are very easily parted from their money.   They don't care how much money the donee may already have, if they think they are getting to be part of a great and glorious culture war it's a case of "shut up and take my money".   

Update:  here's Mark Latham getting uptight -

This from the man who was wandering around Western Sydney with a microphone in 2017 fretting about Muslim views on hitting women, Sharia law and wearing the burqa.    

Maybe Boris is in trouble?

I opined yesterday that Boris Johnson was probably still assured of the Prime Minister job because he is like Trump - the focus of culture war hopes that overcome any consideration of character and past performance.

But I see on Twitter this morning that lots of people are calling out his comments about how Brexit could proceed was based on a fundamental error/lie;  he is also being called a liar about his past association with Steve Bannon; and now the Mirror is running a story that his argument with his girlfriend was because he actually wants to get back with his estranged wife.(!)

It's hard to know which of those, if any, might turn out to be more important.   But it seems his path to the leadership might be more in doubt than I expected.

A bridge made of grass

If you want to see a photo essay about this:

Every year the last remaining Inca rope bridge still in use is cast down and a new one erected across the Apurimac river in the Cusco region of Peru. 

The Q'eswachaka bridge is woven by hand and has been in place for at least 600 years. Once part of the network that linked the most important cities and towns of the Inca empire, it was declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco in 2013.

you can hop over to the BBC.  

Libra scepticism

Axios reckons that everyone may be in a panic (or being prematurely enthusiastic - like the troika of RMIT blockchain conference attendees) about Libra for nothing - because it's likely to never get off the ground.

The reasons they give do sound pretty convincing. 

The ridiculous bag wars

It's a culture war thing for the likes of Adam Creighton that the ban on single use plastic bags in supermarkets is a waste of time.   So he's thrilled today to be able to link to an article in The Australian with the headline "Economy falls through our shopping bags", noting that the paper got its hands on some FOI material about companies complaining to Treasury about this:

However, a slew of companies also complained to the government’s chief economic department about the effect that banning plastic bags was having on slowing activity in the $320 billion retail sector.

“Several firms suggested that the introduction of a ban on plastic bags meant customers reduced their consumption to an amount that they could instead carry, and delayed purchases of heavier groceries,” notes the report, sent from Treasury economist Angelia Grant to Josh Frydenberg and his assistant ministers on April 2.

Contacts also warned Treasury that the poor showing in the retail sector would likely see “continued subdued inflation, with grocery deflation only partly offset by higher power prices”.

To the paper's credit, it does go on (after the sensationalist, tabloid headline) to quote an economist expressing scepticism about these businesses' claim.  Adam seems not to have read past the headline.  Or to have any sensible scepticism.