A Little Of The Old In And Out



(image via nydailynews)

In: Batman: The Dark Knight. As opening day approaches it is instructive to note how rabid the geeks are getting about this film, not in the least because the tragic death of Heath Ledger plays into the gothic character of the film. The business press is literally calculating what effect this single film will have on Time Warner's bottom line. From Marketwatch:

"Tomorrow night film fans will flock to movie theaters to welcome the arrival of 'The Dark Knight,' debuting with nearly 2,500 Thursday midnight performances nationwide, reports Fandango, the nation's leading moviegoer destination.

"Across the country, hundreds of showtimes are sold out through the weekend, from Washington, D.C. to Puyallup, Washington, at http://www.fandango.com/thedarkknight.

"The new "Batman" movie, which currently represents more than 90% of all weekly ticket sales on Fandango, may end up creating a 'Dark Friday' effect at some offices around the country. In a recent poll on Fandango, 38% of 'Knight' fans said they intend to take off a few hours or the entire day on Friday, July 18, in order to catch the movie."

(image via c-r.org)

Out: Joseph Kony. It is rough going negotiating a political peace with a thuggish criminal, and, unfortunately, Uganda has more than it's fair share of those. The alternative to negotiating with Joseph Kony is continued civil war and unrest in Uganda's north. But how does one negotiate with a violent predator? How does one find common ground with a monster who traffics in child soldiers? From Bloomberg:

"Ugandan rebel leader Joseph Kony made new demands on conditions for peace talks in a letter to Riek Machar, the chief mediator, and copied to the United Nations, the African Union and the governments of South Sudan and Uganda.

"In the letter, Kony insists on a new security plan covering the towns of Ri-Kwangba and Nabanga in southern Sudan, where his forces are due to assemble and where he is to meet peace negotiators, Machar's press assistant, Jane Alobo, said by phone from the region's capital, Juba, today. He again demanded that food be delivered to fighters from his Lord's Resistance Army, saying they were close to starvation, Alobo said.

"Machar has been mediating negotiations between Uganda and the LRA since July 2006 in an attempt to end a conflict that has claimed thousands of lives and displaced more than 1.7 million people. Kony, who is wanted for war crimes by the International Criminal Court, failed to sign the final peace accord in April because he wanted assurances about his safety."

In: Clarence Page. If only the Pulitzer-prize winning columnist were on The McLaughlin Group last week to rein in the increasingly senile old bastard of a host's excesses (Averted Gaze). Page had the clearest and sharpest observation about The New Yorker cartoon brouha. From The Salt Lake Tribune:

" ..The New Yorker is doing its job. It is provoking the rest of the country to talk about the smear campaign that has had more of a life than it should, thanks in part to the Internet. Those who think the Blitt cartoon is damaging should think again. The falsehoods are out there and widely embraced, either by people who don't know any better or folks who are looking for some excuse to cast doubt on Obama when they can't find anything else. The Web is like any other village square. Sometimes you've got to clear away the trash."