Has this ever happened to you? You’re watching television, or maybe it’s on in the background while you do something else (yes, I’m one of those people), and you’ve got the television volume at a comfortable level; loud enough to hear, but not loud enough to shatter eardrums. The program-already-in-progress goes into a commercial break, and the next thing you know some guy is screaming at you to buy OxyClean or some such, causing you to jump about three feet before you dive for the remote, to turn the volume down (only to have to turn it back up again when the show starts.)
No matter what you think you’ve heard, TV commercials really don’t get louder than the programs they accompany.
Production tricks only make them sound like they do. It’s called “inconsistent” or “perceived” loudness. Perceived or not, the problem likely will get worse with digital television.
The annoyance is real enough that U.S. Rep. Anna Eshoo is making a federal case of it. Fed up to her ears at being blasted off the couch by commercials, the California Democrat introduced a bill in Congress called CALM — the Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act. It would require the Federal Communications Commission to set standards to keep commercials from running at louder volume than the shows around them. A similar rule in England takes effect next month.
“There’s been a shockingly lot of reaction,” said Eshoo aide Jason Mahler, who noted that the bill quickly picked up nine co-sponsors. “It’s all been favorable.”
This has been somewhere near the bottom of my “There Oughta Be a Law” file for a while now, but I’d love to see it passed. Anna, why not slip it quietly (get it) into some “must pass” funding legislation?
A pretty high school student, knowing the killer is close to breaking through her bedroom door, calls 911 on her PC. Her eyes wide and her heart pounding, she types in her message: “White woman in trouble!” In an instant, her suburban driveway is crowded with cruisers, sirens shrieking and lights flashing, and her wouldabeen slayer is beating a hasty retreat.
Someday historians will look back at America in the decade bracketing the turn of the 21st century and identify the era’s major themes: Religious fundamentalism. Terrorism. War in Iraq. Economic dislocation. Bioengineering. Information technology. Nuclear proliferation. Globalization. The rise of superpower China.
And, of course, Damsels in Distress.
But of course the damsels have much in common besides being female. You probably have some idea of where I’m headed here.
A damsel must be white. This requirement is nonnegotiable. It helps if her frame is of dimensions that breathless cable television reporters can credibly describe as “petite,” and it also helps if she’s the kind of woman who wouldn’t really mind being called “petite,” a woman with a good deal of princess in her personality. She must be attractive — also nonnegotiable. Her economic status should be middle class or higher, but an exception can be made in the case of wartime (see: Lynch).
Put all this together, and you get 24-7 coverage. The disappearance of a man, or of a woman of color, can generate a brief flurry, but never the full damsel treatment. Since the Holloway story broke we’ve had more news reports from Aruba this past week, I’d wager, than in the preceding 10 years.
The damsel— the “White Woman in Trouble” — thanks to the Post, is back.
Not sure if this is going to be a series or not, but sometimes I wonder why — when someone says something with so much obviously wrong with it — no one seems to ask the obvious question. For example, Bill O’Reilly:
On Saturday, former Vice President Al Gore made a surprise appearance at the Netroots Nation convention in Austin, TX. In his speech, Gore praised the gathering of progressives, saying that they are part of an effort to “reclaim the integrity of American democracy.”
While the attendees of Netroots Nation received Gore with enthusiasm, his appearance has caused Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly to declare that Gore has “gone off the deep end.”
On his radio show today, O’Reilly claimed that Gore was now associating himself with the most “hateful group in the country.” “And I’m including the Nazis and the Klan in here,” said O’Reilly.” He then claimed that attending Netroots Nation was “the same as if he stepped into the Klan gathering.”
I haven’t seen anyone asking the obvious question: How exactly does Bill O’Reilly know what a Klan gathering looks like, let alone what it’s like to step into one?
I’m all kinds of late on this, I know, but I was struck by this clip from Bill O’Reilly’s show, in which he and a guest can’t come up with a single reason to oppose same-sex marriage.
It’s an amazing four minutes, in which both O’Reilly and his guest come to the conclusion — from slightly different starting points — that there’s really “no reason” to oppose or prohibit same-sex marriage, once you’ve left aside religious “reasons.”
Sometimes you have to take people by the scruff of their necks and stick their noses in the big pile of shit in the middle of the room before they can see it, let alone smell it.
You might wonder why I posted that slideshow. Well, it started gelling in my mind while I was catching up on my blog reading during my commute to work. (Hey, when you have a five-year-old and an infant, you read when you can.) I came across this on the Air America blog.
No, I don’t mean gay dads. (More about us later.) I mean dads with gay son, who are proud of their gay sons.
I posted about the Details article on heterosexual dads who are worried their sons might be gay. (But, hey, they’re not homophobes. Some of their best friends are gay. So they can’t be homophobic, right?) Well, PFLAG is responding to the article with a weeklong series of posts by dads about why they’re proud of their sons.
OK, I’ll admit up front that PFLAG has a special place in my heart, for many reasons. I still get teary eyed when I see the PFLAG contingent marching in the Capitol Pride parade. Whenever I saw them, I’d usually run out into the middle of their group and get as many hugs from as many supportive parents as I could.
I’ve only recently begun to restrain myself from doing that, since I got kids of my own to parent. (One of whom is big enough to give great hugs.) But if they don’t mind, these PFLAG dads have made their way onto my list of “PFLAG Parents I’d Like To Hug.”
I love finding this kind of thing, and I think it’s worth pointing out when I do. We subscribe to Newsweek, and I usually thumb through the newest issue when it comes in, which is what I did when the “Splitsville” issue arrived. It sounds weird, but I start reading Newsweek from the back. I usually want to read “Newsmakers” first, then see what’s being reviewed as far as books, music, and movies, before I get to the feature story, about “the children of divorce, all grown up.”
Given the subject matter, I wasn’t expecting it to have a gay angle. (Because gay people can’t even get divorced, but that’s another story.) Lo and behold, when I finally got to the photo for the cover story, there it was. The gay angle. It wasn’t the story, but a part of the story. And that, folks, is progress.
Helping out a colleague at work required me to do something I haven’t done in about five years: watch television news. Specifically, I had to watch the Sunday morning news shows, where various political types are interviewed by the likes of Tim Russert and George Stephanopolis. I even had to watch Fox News, something I never to unless I’m tied to a chair with my head immobilized and my eye’s taped open. (See the picture above.)
I was watching Meet the Press, featuring a debate between Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey and Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell (both Democrats) about the Obama CLinton race, when Tim Russert brought up something that seemed, well, strange and brought up rather suddenly.
It ain’t quite Willie Horton. We’ll have to wait for the general before we see anything close to that. But this ad is definitely in that ballpark.
Now, I’m still not supporting either Clinton or Obama in the primaries (though I’ll settle for whichever of them the Democrats nominate). But this doesn’t make me feel any better about Clinton.
Ed Note: This was so much fun, I decided to update the post with a few more casting choices and bump it back up to the top of the blog.
I admit it. I’m one of those people who reads the tabloids while I’m standing in line at the grocery store. (I figure I still have some time before Parker figures out what I’m reading.) I already knew that Oliver Stone is planning a Bush biopic. What I didn’t know was that Josh Brolin will portray Dubya. At least not until I noticed a tabloid headline blaring that Brolin’s stepmom, La Streisand, is furious that he’s doing the part, (and Brolin is allegedly furious that she’s furious) because she’s worried that Dubya might get a sympathetic portrayal. (Meanwhile the folks at Fox & Friends are worried that Streisand’s stepson in the lead role means it’ll be a “hit piece.”)
The tabloid piece got me thinking: who else would I cast in the picture? Brolin is the only cast member listed right now, so the rest of the cast is anybody’s guess. The folks at Radar have already taken a stab at guessing. And while they’ve made some interesting choices, including a few I would have also made, I think there’s still room to make some suggestions of my own. (And, Oliver, if you’re reading this, all I ask is a brief walk-on and/or casting credits.)
When I was a little boy, growing up in Augusta, GA, I wanted to be famous. Actually, I wanted to be a star. I sang along with the radio and one day discovered I had a voice, and eventually—happily—discovered that some people even enjoyed hearing it.
My sister, her best friend, and I used to dream of fame. We made up songs, and sang them into tape recorders. After we saw The Wiz, we learned all the songs, cast ourselves in the parts (I was the scarecrow) and acted out scenes. We dreamed of moving to Hollywood, where it would all happen, of course.
Now, decades later, I’m no closer to fame than I was then, and light years away from stardom. But what I’ve seen from this distance has me thinking that perhaps my youthful dreams are best left that way. I’m not sure I’d want the glare of spotlight that never, ever shuts off shining into every aspect of my life, or on my family. Not based on what I’ve seen and read lately.
I probably shouldn't say this, but I work on K Street. I've even bumped into Robert Novak once, when we were both pedestrians, crossing the street in opposite directions. Now, I'll have remember to keep an eye out, and look both ways before I cross the street, lest Robert Novak run into me.
I don't really care about the Madonna/Alex Rodriguez affair story, because I'm not married to either of them. But in this day and age why would anyone (who's not "in the business" and getting paid for it) intentionally record their sexcapades on video? Why, when there are a thousand different ways for someone to get and distribute that video? How dumb do you have to be to make a 'sex tape' nowadays?
Maybe I'm taking this the wrong way, and I know these aren't Warren Buffett’s actual words of widsom, but nothing irritates me more than hearing things like "Happiness comes from within," and "Find happiness in simple pleasures." From a billionaire? Easy for him to say...
Gimmick or no gimmick, I would sodance with Lance. Hey, I took ballroom dancing in college, and was pretty good at it. Later, I learned to two-step in a gay C&W bar, and was pretty popular because I was a good follower. Not like dragging around a sack of potatoes. So, Lance, you can lead if you want to...
I knew there was a reason I'm not buying an iPhone today. (Besides the fact that I don't "need" one, and the reality that I don't need to spend that much on a tech purchase. It looks like Apple's having a pretty bad day, along with people who did buy iPhones that currently don't work due to server problems.
My friends and I used to joke that in D.C. it's a law that in DC, you're never more than a block from Starbucks. When tourists stop me and ask where's nearest Starbucks, I usually end up pointing in three different directions. But that may change.
I'm getting tired of wanting to write, and needing to write, but not writing because writing is not my job. Anybody know anyone looking to hire a writer?
No, I don’t mean gay dads. (More about us later.) I mean dads with gay son, who are proud of their gay sons.
Ed Note: This was so much fun, I decided to update the post with a few more casting choices and bump it back up to the top of the blog.
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