Even though I’m supposed to be happy and hopeful and post-partisan today, I still think it’s worth looking back on the still-smoldering wreckage of the Bush administration.

• Harper’s Index takes a long look at Bush by the numbers, including several appalling facts even I never knew. (Example: “Years before becoming energy secretary that Spencer Abraham cosponsored a bill to abolish the Department of Energy: 2″)
• Keith Olbermann spends eight minutes simply reciting the various outrages over stock footage. The transcript of this feels like it should be set to the tune of “We Didn’t Start the Fire.”
• Making Light filters Bush through Onion headlines over the years. The Onion’s most startlingly prophetic article is still one of the earliest ones.
• Patrick Farley can’t wrap his head around it and finally just labels the last eight years “all circus and no bread.”
• And finally, Bryan Lambert puts a stake through the heart of his least favorite phrase of the era.

But don’t just take my word for it — Mick Foley agrees in his review of Aronofsky’s film.

You don’t have to be a pro-wrestling fan (current or former) to enjoy The Wrestler, but I think you’ll enjoy it more. We saw it in a theater full of older people, the group that tends to be the chattiest during movies but not all that knowledgeable about faces and heels. When Ram hid a razor blade in his wrist tape before a match, I heard more than one person behind me express bewilderment as to what he was doing. Meanwhile, I found myself nodding appreciatively, knowing what was coming.

Plus, as Foley says, Rourke’s in-ring work is actually pretty good, considering both he and his character are about 50 years old. Plenty of editing, but no stunt doubles that I could see.

Someone more versed in indie-wrestling will get a kick out of indie guys playing themselves (I only recognized Necro Butcher and Ron “The Truth” Killings, now R-Truth in WWE) and the usage of real-life promotions like CZW and ROH.

Two warnings (with sorta-spoilers): First, this is mostly not a happy movie. One scene in particular is very difficult to sit through on a big screen. The lady sitting next to me had her hand over her eyes the whole time. Second, this is one of those movies that doesn’t conclude so much as stop. A lot of times, that kind of storytelling bothers me — it pissed me off in Broken Flowers, for one — but here I think it works. The movie had said everything it needed to say about Randy “The Ram” Robinson and the screwed-up world of pro wrestling.

And I love him even more when he slags Tom Friedman. The release of Friedman’s new book gives Taibbi another chance to go after him.

I’m tempted to quote the whole article, but I’ll try to restrain myself and put the quotes in the “more” section.

Read the rest of this entry »

At the moment, New York is the coldest it been in two years. The current temperature is 11°F, with lows expected in the single digits. It’s so cold it hurts to breath. This morning, I walked from Grand Central to my office hunched over like Groucho Marx.

The forecast calls for equal cold tomorrow, followed by snow on Sunday.

Meanwhile, here’s what’s going on in Tucson:

Okay, okay. Yes. After making fun of the weather in Tucson for years, I’ll admit it: right now I miss it.

Jesse Thorn of Sound of Young America interviews Ben Karlin. Watching this, I was struck by the coincidences of timing. I started reading The Onion every week when I entered college in 1993, the same year Karlin took over as editor. I started watching The Daily Show in 2002, the same year Karlin became executive producer.

Apparently, I’ve been a huge fan of Ben Karlin’s work for fifteen years and never even knew his name.

“What is it with western NFL teams this year? Can anybody west of the Central time zone play this game?”

Three weeks after writing those words and slagging San Diego and Arizona, I’m watching the Cardinals run up the score on Carolina in its 2nd round playoff game. San Diego plays Pittsburgh tomorrow after edging the “vastly superior” Colts in overtime.

This tells me two things. One, I shouldn’t start betting in Caesar’s Palace any time soon. Two, the NFL is ultra-wacky this year.

Random throughts from the last couple of weeks:

• It’s been so windy here that we lost our garbage can in shifts — first the lid blew away, then the empty can escaped our back porch and made off for destination unknown. Perhaps can and lid blissfully re-united and made off for the Caribbean.
• It was nice seeing Ron and Vern last weekend for pizza and improv comedy. Too bad we won’t see them again until next summer.
• I got a DVD of The Dark Knight for Xmas. The movie is just as good the second time around, but to fully enjoy both DK and Begins, you still have to ignore Christian Bale’s goofy, growly Batman voice. Rifftrax posted a pretty funny skit about it last month.
• Maybe it’s because of the writers strike, or maybe this is just the new reality of the TV industry, but this midseason is a lot more interesting than the fall was. Lost, Galactica, Burn Notice, Dollhouse, Breaking Bad, and Drinky Crow on top of my usual shows will make for one busy couch-potato schedule.
• If you care about Doctor Who you probably already know, but the next Doctor has been cast.
• Roger Ebert has jumped on the Doomwagon. Which is nice and all, but I would have been more impressed if he’d written it about a year ago. These days, it’s not hard to see that things are screwed up.