This rules out Jindal in my mind for VP or future President

From HotAir:

Qualified by the usual caveat, of course. He [Jindal] won’t say which theory he favors (beyond acknowledging some unknown role of the creator), but clearly he’s sufficiently sold on ID that he thinks it merits being laid in front of kids as an alternative to evolution. Which is a dodge, really, in the same way that the Truthers’ irritating “just asking questions” defense is a dodge: It uses the spirit of free inquiry as a way to avoid the threshold question of how credible any theory has to be to end up in the curriculum. Doubtless there are far left parents (and far right, per the Paulnuts) who wouldn’t mind seeing competing theories of 9/11 taught in history class so that kids can “make up their own minds,” but that ain’t likely to happen.

I can’t vote for somebody who is anti-science.

I Saw “Speed Racer”

I saw “Speed Racer“. I liked it.

I had watched the old TV show on Sunday mornings when I was kid. It was one of the few animated shows that I liked. The theme song kicked ass!

The movie had a visually interesting/weird comic book feel to it. I liked how the characters were (pretty good actors). I liked that classic scenes from the old TV show were hinted along with bits of the old theme song and sound effects. I liked that it stayed G rated. And even though a corporation was the villain agian in a Hollywood movie, since Pops Racer is a an entrepreneur and the hero it balanced it out again.

Strangely, I was mostly bored by the races themselves.

Recent Movies From Netflix

At first, I subscribed to watch the big Hollywood movies that I hadn’t seen in theaters. I quickly realized most of those films sucked.

Instead, I have gotten the most value from Netflix by viewing obscure or indy films, and TV series from cable (e.g. The Wire, Sleeper Cell, Rome).

For a change though I watched three newish to DVD Hollywood drams:

– Beowulf (a nifty comic book like update/adaptation of the old Story)
– Gone Baby Gone (a gritty layered thriller)
– Eastern Promises (human trafficking and the Russian mob in London

I highly recommend them.

Films For Intelligence Analysis Exercises

Kent’s Imperative has a post about appropriate films for teaching entry level intelligence analyst skills. The authors in the end suggest The Kingdom.

I thought of a few others and emailed them to the authors:

– Day of the Jackal
– The Battle of Algiers
– The Wire (especially season 1)

As stated elsewhere (Eddie/Hidden Unities), the fictional Detective Lester Freeman of the Baltimore Police Major Crimes Unit (from The Wire) is the model Intelligence Analyst on TV.

After sending the email, I though a of one more:

– Russia House (my favorite espionage movie with Sean Connery)