Nearly lost amid the fantastic PR (so far) and blind luck of Barack Obama’s Middle East tour – and the horror show that has been John McCain’s pathetic, flailing response to it – an astonishing story has developed in deepest Serbia this week. Radovan Karadzic, the Bosnian Serb leader who oversaw the rape of Sarajevo, the massacre at Srebrenica and the slaughter of more than 100,000 Muslims during the early 1990s, was finally captured in Belgrade after years in hiding.

The sizzle in this steak is partly in the circumstances: Karadzic, living under the name Dragan Dabic, was masquerading as a long-haired and bearded alternative-medicine guru who claimed to be able to treat everything from impotence to autism. (Thank goodness for that client who demanded an investigation after his erection not only lasted longer than four hours, but spent the whole time watching Judge Wapner and insisting it was “a very good driver.”)

Seeing Karadzic’s pompadour and sloe-eyed mug again, after all these years, couldn’t help but place Obama and McCain’s squabbling over Middle East politics into a fresh context. After all, here was a guy who, at the time of his disappearance in 1995, had been supervising a ruthless campaign of ethnic cleansing for four years. Here was a guy who, in cahoots with his buddy Slobodan Milosevic, brought nearly a decade of war, rape and outright genocide to the former Yugoslavia in order to make that land safe for a single ethnic group.

These were guys, in short, who needed to be Gotten Rid Of, and fast. Sounds a lot like the argument against Saddam Hussein, doesn’t it? Sure, if we’re talking about the aggressive, gassy Saddam of 1990-91, and not the boxed-in, sanctioned-to-his-eyeballs, no-fly-zoned (and, let’s not forget, no-WMD’d) Saddam of 2002-03. (more…)

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For four days now, the left side of the electorate has been scratching its collective head and asking itself, “Why don’t I think this is funny?” Of course, “this” is the cover of the current issue of the New Yorker; it has inspired all manner of hand-wringing and tsk-tsking – as well as a series of progressively more desperate attempts by the man who green-lit the gag, New Yorker editor David Remnick, to scream to the masses, “Would you people just lighten up?”

One general theme of the criticism is the fear that while the cartoon clearly was intended as satire, it might be “read” as true by a certain unsavory slice of the populace. This view is summed up in a cartoon by the Washington Post’s Tom Toles:

Another suggestion, particularly among lefties, is that the New Yorker has offended its target audience because it published an image that eventually might have been dreamed up anyway – by a magazine that caters to Obama haters rather than his likely constituents. Some have noted that they wouldn’t have been surprised to see such a cartoon, stripped of any ironic context, on the cover of National Review. Cartoonist David Horsey of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer has lampooned such literalism, imagining a liberal’s fantasy of how National Review could offend its own audience: (more…)

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A couple weeks ago, I planned a weeknight getaway down to Anaheim to watch the Angels play against their closest rival for the division crown, the Oakland A’s. We took the Metrolink train down from Union Station and stayed at a hotel within walking distance of the ballpark (incidentally, being a pedestrian in Orange County is a thoroughly unpleasant experience. The hostility you feel from passing drivers is about what you’d expect were you to walk around town wearing a “Registered Sex Offender” t-shirt. I’m surprised they even bothered to put in sidewalks when they built the roads).

We were treated to a thoroughly entertaining game, which the home team won 5-3 after a 3-run rally in the bottom of the eighth, capped with a home run that flew over the right field wall and landed not more than a hundred feet away from our seats. The only detraction from the experience was the faithful A’s fan nearby who wasn’t the least bit shy about using his penetrating voice to hurl catcalls at the Angels venerable slugger Vladimir Guerrero. It’s bold to invade an opposing team’s stadium and throw insults at their star player, and I certainly wouldn’t do something like this at Dodger Stadium, but in Orange County, it’s pretty safe to say whatever you want. Out of a perpetual dread of civil litigation, you can rest assured that nobody’s going to do anything except maybe yell back at you. Honestly, the guy’s loudest challenger was actually a nine year old kid. Being an Orioles fan, I didn’t have a dog in the fight, so his heckling didn’t bother me except in the sense that it was completely lacking in originality.

Heckling is an art. And when it’s done well, it can bring about that which is every dedicated fan’s true dream — to affect the outcome of the game in his team’s favor.

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Harrison Ford turns 66 today. (Are you impressed with how I trivialize the category of Current Events in this space week after week? I know I am.) This summer the actor is starring in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the fourth film in the lucrative franchise created by producer George Lucas and director Steven Spielberg on a beach in Hawaii in 1977 the week Lucas’s Star Wars opened. So far it’s earned roughly $310 million, only a few million behind Iron Man, making them the two leaders at the summer box office up to this point. Both films were distributed by Paramount Pictures, a studio that’s happy to have something to celebrate along with last year’s Transformers and Shrek the Third after a long box-office dry spell earlier this decade, but I wonder how much money they’re making off of Crystal Skull and Iron Man. The former was financed by Lucasfilm Ltd., the latter by Marvel Studios, meaning those companies — and particularly Lucas, Spielberg, and Ford for Crystal Skull — will reap most of the profits, not Paramount. Similarly, Transformers and Shrek the Third were inherited by Paramount after it bought DreamWorks (Spielberg’s a cofounder and co-owner) in 2006, meaning they can’t call those their own either, not to mention this summer’s animated DreamWorks hit, Kung Fu Panda. But they can take full credit for Mike Myers’s latest comedy, The Love Guru! Oh, wait, that one bombed. Sorry, Paramount. (If you had no interest in that tangent about Paramount and its box-office bragging rights, then you should be done singing “Happy Birthday” to Mr. Ford right about now, so we can move on.)

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On the day we celebrated my daughter Catie’s first birthday, my good friend Robert Simonson came out to the suburbs for the party and marveled at the mountain of toys piled up on the living room rug. “Why does she need all these toys?” he asked, half rhetorically. “You know, the Shakers gave each child one doll made out of cloth, and those kids used their imaginations and made out just fine.”

In my continuing consumerist sprint to reject Robert’s admonition, last month I took Catie (now 6) to see an opening-weekend screening of Kit Kittredge: An American Girl. And what a glorious day it was! Having already dressed ourselves up and taken ourselves to a matinee of Wicked at Hollywood’s legendary Pantages Theatre, Catie and I booked across town to the Grove for the perfect nightcap to our daddy-girl culture-fest. After a leisurely and purchase-filled roam around American Girl Place, the colossal retail center of the AG empire, we crossed the street and settled into a pair of newfangled multiplex stadium-seats to take in the doll franchise’s first big-screen adventure.

Yes, it was a special time – made even more special because Felicity and Julie came along. Felicity is a proper, well-bred lass from the 1770s who believes fervently in animal rights but isn’t so sure about revolution – at least not until her father’s brash apprentice convinces her that even young ladies have a role to play in securing their rights. Julie, on the other hand, is a hippie chick from the 1970s who is mighty concerned about conservation (she saves eagles!) and the nascent women’s lib movement (she plays basketball on the boys’ team!).

Felicity and Julie are, of course, inanimate objects. Yet I know all of these biographical details about them because we’ve read the tie-in books that play such a large role in the American Girls’ runaway popularity. Up on the screen that night was the filmic story of yet another archetype, the depression-era heroine Kit – scion of the only FDR lovers in conservative Cincinnati, friend and defender of hobos, crusader for social justice in the face of police profiling. The message of Kit Kittredge is one of tolerance, of forgiveness, of judging not lest ye be judged…and, of course, of Girl Power!

In other words, Phyllis Schlafly’s worst nightmare. (more…)

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Did everyone have a rockin’ Fourth of July? (Please answer with an affirmative “Woooooo!”) And are you still rockin’ at the tail end of this three-day weekend? (Please answer with an affirmative “I am, but it becomes more difficult with each passing year to rock as hard as I used to, especially once kids entered the picture, and I can’t even remember the last time my wife and I got a little drunk and rocked twice in one–” Whoa whoa whoa, don’t put words in my mouth as I’m putting them in yours! Just say “Woooooo!” again and let’s leave it at that.) Well, stop that rockin’ for a second, or at least be more flaccid about it, because I want to tell you about a patriotic soft-rock event I attended last week in Chicago.

On Friday, June 27, Schubas hosted “Stay Smooth VIII.5: The Search for Smoothlantis,” the north-side tavern’s latest celebration of “smooth” music, featuring a special performance by Nashville’s Silver Seas. Local DJs Bald Eagle and STV SLV were dressed in their finest sailing duds as they spun ‘70s and ‘80s soft rock, a genre that’s been rechristened “yacht rock” in the past few years to describe the no-pain, no-gain sound of artists like Christopher Cross, whose 1980 smash hit “Sailing” is an obvious touchstone, and whose doppelganger was collecting money at the door, or at least there was a similarity if you stared at him long enough, which he didn’t seem to appreciate on any level. Three of the genre’s heaviest hitters are Michael McDonald, Kenny Loggins, and Steely Dan, who created all-time pop classics like the Doobie Brothers’ “What a Fool Believes” (1978), written by McDonald and Loggins, and Steely Dan’s “Peg” (1977), with backing vocals by McDonald, who is without a doubt the white-bearded Poseidon of Smoothlantis.

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Chicago celebrated gay pride over the weekend with a parade, a “queer prom,” and enough inordinate self-esteem and alternative lifestyles to choke a Clydesdale. You go, gay people! I absolutely adore what you’ve done with the Bravo network, and your secret invasion of the Republican party these last few years has been faaaaaaabulous! Unfortunately, there was a party pooper in your midst on Saturday afternoon at the corner of Halsted and Addison, a man wearing a sandwich-board sign bearing the slogan PRIDE LEADS TO SHAME. But what does Evelyn “Champagne” King’s “Shame” lead to on my iPod if I press play and then use the shuffle option? “The Fool on the Hill,” by the Beatles.* (I love the shuffle option. It’s the Magic 8-Ball of the 21st century.)

Now, pride is one of the seven deadly sins, and if God would get off His duff and revise His original list, I’m sure He’d add a space for homosexuality at number eight, as fundamentalist Christians have requested via prayer and daytime talk shows for years now. (In a recent e-mail God told me, “Rob, I got paperwork that stretches back to the 1400s — and I’m talking B.C., my friend — so don’t expect any amendments or late additions anytime soon. Also, you should probably get that mole on your neck checked out.” I don’t like when He calls me Rob, but He’s God, so I let it slide. And it’s a skin tag, not a mole.) But until that day it’ll have to remain a nonfatal sin, and if something like a gay pride parade offends you, just call it a “double whammy” parade and see if that suits you better. We’re never going to be able to make everybody get along with everybody else, but as long as we can find nonviolent ways to help each other ignore the people we can’t tolerate, then that should be good enough.

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“I’m not afraid of insects taking over the world, and you know why? It would take about a billion ants just to aim a gun at me, let alone fire it. And you know what I’m doing while they’re aiming it at me? I just sort of slip off to the side, and then suddenly run up and kick the gun out of their hands.”

- Jack Handey from “Deep Thoughts”

Years ago, a good friend of mine was living in an apartment complex with his wife.  It was one of those huge apartment complexes with maps prominently displaying arrows with the words “You Are Here” to help lost visitors navigate through a maze of buildings that looked identical. It was easy to get lost in that place, and if you weren’t sure what building number the person you knew lived in, you could easily get lost since each of the individual units had letters on the doors instead of numbers.  So, for example, my friend lived in building 2250, apartment A. If I went to the building next to his – say it was building 2255 – there was an apartment A there as well. The layout of complex was such that one could easily confuse the buildings because the exteriors and the entrances to the apartments were pretty much the same.

Early one morning – after the bars closed – my friend awoke to the sound of some guy pounding on his door demanding to be let in ‘cause he was going to “Beat the shit out you, Lisa.” My friend’s name is Matt and his wife is Casey.  Obviously, the drunken idiot had the wrong apartment. Matt called the cops to say there was a guy trying to break in.  The police dispatcher said, “Sir, are you properly armed?”  My friend said he didn’t own a gun, and the dispatcher said in a disappointed manner, “Oooh, um…well, we’ll get there when we can.” The drunky guy went away after my friend told him (by yelling at him from behind the closed front door) that he had the wrong place.  The cops showed up about five minutes after the incident to take a report and search the complex. (more…)

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The seven words you can’t say on TV. There. The thing that every blobit (blog + obit = blobit) is going to focus on is out of the way and we can get to what George Carlin really was on about. It wasn’t curse words. It wasn’t drugs. It was freedom.

From his early exposure as the hippy-dippy mailman on Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In to his most recent and venomous HBO comedy specials, from his ill-fated sitcom and recurring role on Thomas the Tank Engine to Bill & Ted and a handful of sardonic, sarcastic, and sometimes sacrilegious best-selling books, Carlin was a guy who wanted to say whatever he damn well felt like saying, regardless of whose fragile sensibilities would be crushed in the blowback. The essence of the man was his love of the language, both the sacred and the profane. His classic skit about hair, for instance:

I’m aware some stare at my hair.
In fact, to be fair,
Some really despair of my hair.
But I don’t care,
Cause they’re not aware,
Nor are they debonair.
In fact, they’re just square.

They see hair down to there,
Say, “Beware” and go off on a tear!
I say, “No fair!”
A head that’s bare is really nowhere.
So be like a bear, be fair with your hair!
Show it you care.
Wear it to there.
Or to there.
Or to there, if you dare!

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Earlier this month New York attorney general Andrew Cuomo reported that he had sent his staff to 1,000 pharmacies across the state in March, April, and May and found more than 250 that were selling expired milk, eggs, baby formula, and over-the-counter medication. The two biggest culprits were the CVS and Rite Aid chains. So what else have these drugstores not been telling consumers?

1. CVS-brand sparkling water gets its sparkle from Darfurian children’s tears. (White Lion, “When the Children Cry” [download])

2. That lawn chair you bought in the “seasonal” aisle? Someone had sex on it. (The Band, “Rockin’ Chair” [download])

3. Whenever you bought an impulse item at the front counter in 2000 and 2004, your name was added to a GOP database of potential swing voters most likely to vote for George W. Bush. (Everything But the Girl, “Politics Aside” [download])

4. Expired baby formula mixed with expired teeth whitener will totally get you high. (Glen Phillips, “I Want a New Drug” [download])

5. The security camera adds 25 pounds. (Joe Henry, “Fat” [download])

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