May 1, 2008
"Richardson drops out. Grows a beard."
The whole story of the race for the Democratic nomination in 7 minutes of short sentences and sentence fragments. Funny! Spiffy graphics. Pretty fair and balanced too.
[Bad code fixed.]
BUT: The wrong code was for another Slate video that people liked. It's here.
AND: Wow! The still image on the embedded video is great. Slate deserves huge credit for raising the standards for web video. This is really beautiful and brilliant!
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23 comments:
Bad link. That video has nothing to do with Politics.
Good link. That video has nothing to do with politics.
Ugh. Fixed. Thanks.
So the other thing was good, eh?
Kinky Friedman said yesterday on Imus that the only Hispanic supporter Obama has left is Bill Richardson.
Nice video. It doesn't quite make visible what it needs to, that the media go for ratings, and the candidates go for what the media needs.
And the media audience is morons.
It's a little visible, but not enough.
Too bad the video's creators missed the 2.6 billion in earmarks Hillary! has requested this year. Can anyone say "Superdelegate for sale!"
Kinky Friedman said yesterday on Imus that the only Hispanic supporter Obama has left is Bill Richardson.
Curiously, a lot of formerly staunch Cuban-Americans here in South Florida are pro-Obama, a trend which has fascinated me as I see it happen before my very eyes here.
(As usual, Cubans bucking the trend amongst Hispanics in the US, and that could be because they don't fit the "Hispanic" mold, they're white, educated, and wealthier -- typical white city-dwelling elites)
I was at a bookstore last Sunday, when I overheard two men, uncle and nephew, talking about this. The younger guy, aged 35, was very pro-Obama. Older guy, slightly for Obama. When they passed a Reagan bio on the table, the uncle mentioned something about "Reegan", which I didn't catch but it sounded wistful.
Then the younger guy interjected with "I am 110 times out of 100 in favour of Obama."
They left, but not without a crack about Helen Reddy's book, which was stacked in two enormous piles on the way out (I had noticed and giggled to myself the same idea): "Don't think anyone's that interested in Helen Reddy."
I am woman, hear me roar, indeed.
Cheers,
Victoria
Abt the video:
Michael Moore has a lot to answer for, and I hate that.
Every political "doc" is now quick cut-aways, interspersed with apposite cutesy film outtakes, and a sardonic monotone narrator, all meant for the kids who grew up on MTV with their short-attention spans.
Yeah, it's decent, funny at times, a cool effort. But if you're reading Slate, it seems to me you don't need a primer.
Seems to me they just wanted to make fun of John Edwards and Bill Richardson, so bully for them.
Cheers,
Victoria
Wicked boring.
It's interesting to watch this and remember how many times Obama has done better than Clinton. He's been down so many days in a row now. Puts things in perspective.
Ann:
What you may not realize is that this video is directly modeled after one released a few weeks ago by the SciFi Channel to summarize the last three seasons of Battlestar Galactica in eight minutes (warning: 15-second commercial at the start).
But it's quite funny in its own right. :-) ..bruce..
The still is a soap opera Rushmore.
Mt. Crisco Corners, or Mt. Ivoryville.
Great men are carved there, including Hillary.
It's style reminds me of the comedy The Compleat Works of Wllm Shkspr (Abridged).
They do not require real knowledge of the issues beforehand, as a surface recall will suffice "oh yeaaaaahh, I remember that".
Seemed accurate enough. Victoria has remarked elsewhere that:
"No, my thought about comics like Stewart, et al. blurring the lines between political commentating and comedy is because they believe the American public are not deep enough for straight political discourse.
So it has to be served to them with yuks."
I wonder if maybe we aren't deep enough. Or maybe the ironic distance thing is wearing a bit thin.
Its style reminds me of This American Life. Does Andy Bouve not sound exactly like Ira Glass?
There is a running theme, and one I think is spot on:
"People think this [whatever it is] is important. It's not."
Thanks for the BSG video link, bwebster, but I believe you can trace this sped-up deadpan recap-video style back to last year's widely circulated "7 Minute Sopranos":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tz_Ees_-kE4
Actually, I'm pretty sure even the Battlestar recap is predated by Lost in 8:15. I can't prove it, but the opening donkey is straight from Lost. Now I'm wondering. Who makes these? Is it the same crew? What's the timeline? (Perhaps they should put out "Recap Videos in 0:25".)
Gah. I hadn't even seen the Sopranos one. (How the heck does one search for these?)
You're all wrong!
These reduxes all were preceeded by Anna Russell's magnificent quickie explanation of "The Ring of the Nibelungs".
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7934013448528553422
"I'm not making this UP you KNOW!"
We miss you, Anna!
Cheers,
Victoria
I usually vote by haircut.
The last election was easy, since I preferred the haircut of Bush to that of Kerry (Kerry's hair needs emergency stylists).
Naturally, I would have voted for Edwards had he been at the top of the ticket.
This time around too I kept rooting for Edwards: solely on the basis that I loved his haircut!
This time around I'm incredibly
confused: Obama's got hair that I'm not used to evaluating on a presidential basis, as does Hillary.
And McCain hasn't got a lot of hair left.
I'm really struggling here to find
some criteria by which to judge.
It's true that I do listen to the policy statements made by each, and am concerned about the gaffes, and witticisms that come down the road, but finally, it's the haircut that is going to make the difference for me.
Hillary's hair is a little too stiff, or something. Does she use too much spray? Obama's hair I believe is too closely shorn to his head, and this disturbs me.
McCain's hair has a kind of wispy quality, an dit appears to me to be uneven, indicating perhaps flare-ups, or temper tantrums.
And yet I don't think there are enough superdelegates to get Edwards back into the saddle with his super cut. His hair told me everything I need to know: here is a man in good health, who has a smooth even personality, who takes care of even the smallest details while yet maintaining a sense of the overall, and does it with style.
When I'm looking at the video, that's pretty much what I'm looking at: the sequence of events as quite simply: hair events, hair choices.
And I think the American people have chosen the wrong hairstyles all around.
I miss Reagan.
Nice job on the video. Not sure they mentioned "Iraq," though.
Bunnies did it first, maybe.
Victoria, thanks for the Anna Russell link. I've heard that once before. It was good to hear it again so many years later.
Oh, I'm so happy I caught your comment of thanks, Peter!
Glad you are a fellow Anna Russell fan. She and Victor Borge are so missed...
Cheers,
Victoria
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