Makes me feel nostalgic

The rise and fall of the UFO : A view From the Bridge

A bit sad, really, the decline of the UFO.  It was pretty interesting reading about them in the 70's and 80's.  Not sure when I would have read my last "serious" book about them - probably in the late 1990's or early 2000's, I would think.

All class

So, Trump does a bit of his improvisational work in front of a rally, including saying he doubts Hillary has been faithful to Bill, and imitates her near collapse on 9/11. 

You would have to be pretty thick and/or pretty obnoxious yourself to consider him to have the maturity and temperament to lead a country as important as America.  Hence, the only place I see his Australian defenders are at Catallaxy, in threads but also in posts by Steve Kates.   To his credit, laissez faire blogmeister Sinclair Davidson is not on Team Trump;  but it looks like he might need a tranquillizer gun with which to get Kates from believing and posting about every bit of Trump paranoia circulating on the 'net.  

Thoughts on The Godfather

There aren't that many "classic" movies on Stan, unfortunately, but I noticed that The Godfather films are all there, and viewed the first one, for the first time in my life, last night.   (I was 12 when it came out, and just never got around to viewing it as an adult.)

I have to say, I don't quite understand the very high regard in which it is held.

The first hour or so is good; very good in fact.  The whole opening sequence at the wedding is engaging and a nice way to introduce the characters.   The initial start of the Mafia wars is handled well, but after that, it started to lose me: 

*   I didn't like the sudden leaps forward in time in the second half with inadequate explanation of how the characters got there (emotionally, not physically).  Biggest case in point - Michael reappearing in the US after disappearing for (I think) two years, and immediately asking Kay to marry him.  Nothing about why or how quickly she accepts this - and Michael is obviously not the same guy she was in love with at the start of the movie.

*  Which bring me to Al Pacino's acting - for a movie about his character's descent into the banality of the Mafia's brand of corporate evil (where murder is nothing personal - just "business"), we really don't get much insight into why he takes the path.  His acting after his character has taken the first step (with the murder in the restaurant) is really just somewhat static, unemotional staring for the most part.  (The character seems a lot more unengaged in life than his father.)  The problem may well be with the script - I assume the novel gives more insight into his inner emotions, but the movie sure doesn't.

*  This may be considered an unfair comparison, but the movie suffered in my mind when it reminded me of The Untouchables, which I do hold in very high regard as a thrilling, well written and great looking gangster movie with a serious moral question at its heart.

There is one other positive thing that struck me about The Godfather after it finished - the complete lack of any serious swearing.   It was made in 1972 and got an R rating at the time, I think:  I'm sure they could have fitted some in, and it would presumably have been authentic to the period.   But it is one of the clearest examples around of a movie which can feel completely authentic with a complete lack of swearing.   Especially compared to the tedious use of swearing that became commonplace in subsequent (especially Martin Scorsese directed) gangster movies.

Anyway, with my overall somewhat underwhelmed response, I see that I am not entirely alone - if you Google the topic, you find quite a few people asking the question "Am I the only person who doesn't think The Godfather was all that great?"   Don't get me wrong - the movie didn't annoy me in the way other over-rated movies have done.  (I should make a list one day.)  But it does seem puzzling to me that no critic seems to have noted the above points as inadequacies in the finished product.   [Update:  here's one article that is harsher on the movie than I am, but it basically agrees with the points I make about the incomplete explanation of key characters and their motives.]

Finally, some trivia from the internet age:

* the translated lyrics to the obviously risque song at the wedding can be found here;

* I hadn't heard this before - but Wikipedia tells me that the horses head was a real one.  I thought it looked pretty convincing.  Yuck. 

A journalist's lucky day

The Time I Found Donald Trump’s Tax Records in My Mailbox - The New York Times

Journalism is a funny professional - the average practitioner is (with some justification, if anyone has been on the receiving end of an erroneous report) usually viewed with low regard, but we all know we have to have them.  And while their day to day routine is probably rarely worth writing about, when we get to read a story like this one, it does make it sound like a "once in a lifetime" scoop may make it all worthwhile.   

Eating and drinking

As we all know, the endorsement of products and establishments by this blog is a YUGE bonus for them (in the Trumpian sense of "I've paid a YUGE amount of taxes over the years"), but I do it gratis (in the Trumpian sense of "his businesses have for decades received the benefit of government infrastructure gratis.")

So, this weekend leads me to make the following endorsements:

*  Toro Bravo - the tapas/steak restaurant/bar on Brunswick Street, Fortitude Valley.   This was the second time we've eaten there, and I reckon it's pretty great for its tapas or paella.  (We haven't had steak there, but suburban pub steaks are probably just as good and in many cases likely to be a bit less expensive.   But perhaps I should head in on the "2 for one" Tuesdays and try the steak, then I'll know.)  

*  a few years back, when I started singing the praises of craft beer, I did agree with a Slate article that too many went overboard with intense hops.  Yet I think my palate has subsequently adjusted.  I had previously avoided James Squires Hop Thief for the obvious reason that naming it after hops was a pretty good sign that I may not like it.   But I recently did, and I was wrong - it's good.

I also am tending to find some of the less hopped James Squires a bit bland now.  And while some people might dispute that this mass manufacturer (who, I am happy to see, is marching on tap into mainstream bars everywhere) is really a "craft" beer maker, you know what I mean - who cares as long as the beer maker has taken up the variety of flavours that smaller craft breweries got us used to.

*  The Ploughman's Lunch at the Pig and Whistle, West End:  Although I see there is a Pig and Whistle Tavern down in Victoria, as far as I can tell, the Pig and Whistle Pubs are a Brisbane only chain that share a franchise like set menu.   I wish they wouldn't be so much into trying to be sports bars, but there is usually a quieter area you can find,  and they're not bad for the occasional visit, although my wife and I think the food menu has for too many items become a bit expensive.  (It may also just be my age not keeping up with inflation - we even complain about the cost of feeding a family of four with anything above the basics at McDonalds now.)   Anyhow, I've decided that their Ploughman's Lunch at $29 for a good sized platter that makes for the right amount for lunch for 2 is pretty good value, and the warm herbed olives were especially nice.

*  Domino's Chefs Best range:  have I endorsed these before?   As with all pizza, avoid the "all meat" choices, but apart from those, this range continues to impress, with the new Lamb Tzatziki being my current recommendation.  Very nice

So, no wind turbine was damaged?

I was concerned that the attack on the SA "let's blame renewables" story would suffer embarrassment if it later was revealed that in fact some of the State's turbines were damaged in the storms.  But so far, no word on that.  As I suggested the other day, it's kind of impressive if pylon toppling storms don't cause turbine damage, isn't it?  (Yeah, I know - the pylons may have been far from any turbines.  What I would like to see is the electricity authorities putting up a map of where all the damage happened to the grid during the storms - not just from wind, but also lightning.)  

The hard questions

Elon Musk plans to colonize Mars. We have many questions. - Vox

Sorry to be such a Mars skeptic (or sceptic, to keep Homer happy.)  But billionaires dreams can just run too far ahead of practical reality.

Lessons for today

Why the Father of Modern Statistics Didn’t Believe Smoking Caused Cancer

Found at Jason Soon's tweets, a really interesting article about a brilliant but cranky statistician who chose to spend his retirement arguing against the medical establishment regarding their acceptance of the smoking/lung cancer causal link.

Two things about the story I wanted to note:

1.  I had never heard this before - one of the changes which researchers thought might have accounted for the rapid increase in lung cancer in Britain mid last century was something a bit hard to believe they ever took seriously - a rapid increase in road tarring. (!):

What was the cause? Theories abounded. More people than ever were living in large, polluted cities. Cars filled the nation’s causeways, belching noxious fumes. Those causeways were increasingly being covered in tar. Advances in X-ray technology allowed for more accurate diagnoses. And, of course, more and more people were smoking cigarettes.

Which of these factors was to blame? All of them? None of them? British society had changed so dramatically and in so many ways since the First World War, it was impossible to identify a
single cause. As Fisher would say, there were just too many confounding variables....

At the beginning of the study, Doll had his own theory.  “I personally thought it was tarring of the roads,” Doll said. But as the results began to come in, a different pattern emerged. “I gave up smoking two-thirds of the way though the study."

 (By the way, Doll is one of the researchers who confirmed the link with tobacco;  Fisher is the name of the statistic who went to his death disputing it was proved.) 

2.  The similarity with modern climate change contrarianism is clear and obvious.  A science consensus emerges and is widely publicised - a mere handful of credible scientists (well, I assume Fisher might have had some supporters) spend the end of their careers arguing that everybody else is wrong; it's not proved; it could be something else no one else has conclusively ruled out, etc.   Then cranky contrarians die, and everybody else gets on with what was always correct. 

The only pity here is that what's at stake for climate change is climate affecting billions.  At least Fisher was only harming himself and those who were silly enough to follow his arguments.

Just nuts

I Score the First Debate | Scott Adams' Blog

Hey, I haven't checked in on how nutty, nutty (or uber troll - it still seems possible to me that he's only pretending to be a Trump loving fruit loop) Scott Adams rated the first Presidential debate.

Let's see - second paragraph, scores Hillary the winner "on points".   Sounds not mad; but wait, debate scores don't matter - he's going to look at how they made people feel.  Uh oh.

Here's how he assesses Clinton:

Clinton looked (to my eyes) as if she was drugged, tired, sick, or
generally unhealthy, even though she was mentally alert and spoke well.
But her eyes were telling a different story. She had the look of someone
whose doctors had engineered 90 minutes of alertness for her just for
the event.... Clinton’s smile seemed forced, artificial, and frankly creepy.

Trump, on the other hand:

 Trump was defensive, and debated poorly at points, but he did not look crazy....

Speak for yourself, Adams.

And how does losing the debate work for Trump:  it makes him the winner, of course:

But Trump needed to solve exactly one problem: Look less scary. Trump
needed to counter Clinton’s successful branding of him as having a bad
temperament to the point of being dangerous to the country. Trump
accomplished exactly that…by…losing the debate....

Clinton won the debate last night. And while she was doing it, Trump won
the election. He had one thing to accomplish – being less scary – and
he did it.

Good Lord.  I don't think I have ever read a nuttier commentator on politics than the contorting delusionist that Trump love has turned Adams into.

Update:  hey look!   A couple of days later, and Slate has a lengthy article looking at the decline of Adams.

The comments are interesting too:  quite a few people agree with me - he used to come across as eccentric but relatively mild mannered and somewhat interesting.  Then, when I wasn't paying attention to him for a couple of years, he had an alt.right style conversion.  And some people (also like me) wonder if it it is a gigantic joke he is playing on readers - but it's gone on too long for that explanation, surely.

Also as I suspected - he is now divorced.   As people in comments write:

Professor Stagflation and his Home for Peculiar Adults makes another premature call

Who knew that electricity wind turbines could cause this amount of damage?:

Nick Xenophon, apparently.  [That's sarcasm.]  He normally seems to me to be more sensible, but yesterday he rushed in to make some "we're obviously doing renewable energy wrong" announcement as a result of the South Australian state wide blackout before having any idea what might have been the real cause of the problem.   (Something like 22 cases of pylons being bent - and lots and lots of lightning - has something to do with it.)

This in turn was too much of a temptation for Professor Davidson Stagflation, who posted an endorsement of Xenophon's comments at Catallaxy, the Home for Peculiar Adults.  (Apparently, the new Tim Burton film of similar name is pretty good.)  This, of course, lead to a pile on of nearly a couple of hundred peculiar, not to mention not very bright, adults, all also certain that turbines had something to do with this.

Now, I should caution:   I haven't heard anything about whether any of the State's wind turbines were damaged in the storms.  (It would be a little surprising if they escaped completely unscathed, to be honest.)

But if the electricity market folk are saying that this blackout would have happened regardless of the source of electricity, and there are twenty or so cases of pylons being bent like pretzels, I suspect we can believe them. 

Oh - and congratulations to commenter Brian at Catallaxy - who at 12.18 am, after the relentless pile on of know-it-alls about renewable energy had been mocking the State, finally said "err, actually it might not have had much to do with that, after all." I think he was the one voice of moderation in the thread.

Update:   Chris Uhlmann, who is the ABC's resident renewables/climate skeptic, also gets a low grade for pumping up the issue of "instability" in the SA grid (because of wind power) before the full extent of physical damage was known.   Come the revolution, he'd be the only ABC journalist I'd want sent to Siberia. 

Not your typical breakdown

Marilyn: ‘I sat in a room for 20 years, taking crack and watching the Alien films’ | Music | The Guardian

I have the vaguest memory of the minor pop celebrity Marilyn in the 1980's (although I hasten to point out I didn't even care for Culture Club and Boy George's music, let alone this guy's.) But, there's no doubt, his account of what he did for 20 years following a nervous breakdown is so odd you'd find it hard to believe in a movie:

He retreated to his mother’s house in Hertfordshire and stayed there for 20 years, “without going out, unless it was to the hospital or a dealer, or a doctor. But in general I just sat in a room for 20 years. I didn’t want contact with people. The phone would ring and I just wouldn’t pick it up. The curtains were always drawn, I didn’t know whether it was night or day.”

What did he do all day? “You know the Alien movies? I had the box set of that. I had my laptop and my drug paraphernalia was all set up around me. And I’d watch the first Alien film, then the second, then the third, fourth, fifth. And when it got to the end of the fifth one, I’d put the first one back on again. So that was it. Over and over again. It was, like, my life has gone out of control, but I can control this, this tiny little bubble of behaviour: that was my safety, sitting in front of this computer screen with what I’m watching, and I know all the dialogue
and I know what’s going to happen. I could control how I felt. ‘Oh, I’m bit tired, let me have some crack. Oh, I’m a bit depressed, let’s have some heroin. I need to go to sleep, I’ll take a downer.’ I just wanted to die, but I couldn’t do that, I think because I was brought up a
Catholic, with that idea that if you kill yourself you go to purgatory. I kept thinking, ‘Well, it’ll be just my ****ing luck, I’ll kill myself and wake up in exactly the situation I’m trying to get away from and it’ll be for eternity.’ At least I know this is going to end at some point.”

 He's OK now, though, so all's well that ends well; or something like that, I guess....

Update:  I see from comments at The Guardian (not as witty as I hoped in this case) that many are skeptical about how a one (minor) hit wonder had enough money to fund a 20 year drug habit.  Quite true.  It could all be a tall story. 

Read Hot Air grinding its teeth

Trump on Miss Universe: No, really, she gained a massive amount of weight - Hot Air Hot Air

Yes - it is hard to see how Trumpkins can possibly believe that their man is a brilliant media tactician when he, completely unnecessarily, revisits losing points and helps confirm that he is easily baited.

Also interesting to see the comments following this showing that a large number of this blog's readers thought Trump was terrible in the debate.  Of course, some of his supporters weigh in with fat Latino jokes, too. 

Vague dreams

Elon Musk Unveils His Plan For Colonizing Mars : The Two-Way : NPR

Let's see how his car business pans out, before anyone gets too excited that this guy's Mars dreams will do any better.

When will a billionaire do something really useful for off planet colonization - like sponsor some Moon exploration that is specifically about locating any large reserves of ice?

Clearly, Clinton won

I see that Right wing blogs from Catallaxy to Powerline have up posts either outright lamenting Trump's debate performance, or giving him luke warm praise for not self immolating completely (and claiming that it won't swing any voters anyway.)    This is most definitely conclusive evidence that Clinton came out the winner. 

Mind you, I can't wait for Catallaxy's nuttiest economist, Steve Kates, to weigh in on it.   I'm going for "A narrow win by Trump, who had to face the most biased moderation in Presidential debate history" as his line.   Or I could be wrong: he might have discerned through the haze of Trump love that clouds his mind that his hero stuffed it up, and he's on medication before he can write a post admitting it.

And by the way:  this column just up at The Atlantic is very obviously right - Trump has a clear cruel streak, evident repeatedly in this campaign by his bizarre personal taunting of not only people who he opposes, but even those who have capitulated and endorsed him.   

Yay for Australian tech

Australian technology runs world’s largest single-dish radio telescope in China – Astronomy Now

This new telescope looks pretty awesome.  And I wouldn't mind betting that some Hollywood type is thinking how it could be used as a location in the next James Bond or Mission Impossible film (helping guarantee Chinese box office, too.)   But - they had better use it in a way that makes at least some sense.  Not like the travesty of GoldenEye. 

New stuff for fillings

Professor unveils first data on new dental fillings that will repair tooth decay

Climate sensitivity fight

The Snyder Sensitivity Situation � RealClimate

An important post up at Real Climate disputing a high figure for possible climate sensitivity which is in at least the PR for a new paleo climate paper.  Jim Hanson appears in comments too.

This doesn't exactly fit in with the denier theory that climate scientists make stuff up to enhance research grants and their careers generally.  Would they admit that?  Hardly...

Great moment in social science

And this was before Pokeman Go, which almost certainly could form the basis for another silly essay...

The Democrat voting libertarian

Will the Left Survive the Millennials? - The New York Times

Oh yeah, I noticed this last week and forgot to pass it on.  Lionel Shriver has her say on the Brisbane Writer's Festival speech, and while most of it is OK, it is mainly of interest because she says she's been a life long "Democratic" voter. 

Doesn't this help confirm what I said when I posted about her column in which she said she identified as a Libertarian?   If you support gun control, think health care like the NHS works well, believe in climate change and have always voted Democrat, you're pretty far from being in the same tent as a libertarian.  If you ask me...

Ailes's long history

I didn't realise that former Fox News sleazemaster Roger Ailes had such a long history of supplying "zingers" to Republican Presidential candidates, until I saw this segment from Samantha Bee's show last night:



(I still don't care that much for her high strung comedy persona on this show, but you can learn things from anyone.)