catching up on my online reading
Well, the photo shoot with the high-profile politician was relatively succesful (pick up the paper July 27 and you'll find out who it was). It went much better than the interview with the high-profile celebrity (pick up next week's paper to find out who that was and then think about the fact that despite popular opinion I am capable of keeping my mouth shut, as evidenced by the fact that I am not going off on a tirade about what a bad interview it was, even though I feel like it. Suffice it to say, I will NEVER be a celebrity journalist. I like interviewing politicians and activists and writers and thinkers; celebrities, not so much).
I am taking a deep breath.
OK, as I was saying. Slate has an interesting article today about the rivalry between LANL and Livermore
I mentioned, the other day, that Greg Mello and David Bacon had stopped by to talk about LANL and also to make sure I had the press materials for their July 15 event on writers addressing the nuclear age which looks very interesting. One thing I think is that on the one hand, yes, it's a good time for anti-nuke activists to put some heat on the nation's nuclear policy, particularly given all the problems LANL has had. And yet, and maybe I'm wrong, there is this weird disconnect where I don't really get the sense that most people are too worked up over LANL over nuclear issues right now. Maybe it's because liberals who would be worked up over it are busy being worked up over the war and George W., or maybe it's just because it's hard to focus on something you might want to change when it's been the same for so long. Well, there will clearly be changes for LANL down the road, it's just a question of who will manage it and what direction that will take. I've been told, by some, that morale isn't good at the lab (which wouldn't be shocking; I'm sure working somewhere that's been relatively villified must be challenging at times, particularly given that so many people who work there work hard and are very smart and, in most cases, are doing work they believe in, not trying to destroy the universe. I think this is the problem with societal/political issues once they are vernacularly entrenched. It's hard to remember there are people involved and thus, theoretically at least, the potential for change. Or something like that. This is also the problem, I would imagine, with working for the government, something I've thus far avoided).
OK, that parenthetical statement got me really off course and I've just reread it 5 times and can't figure out how to make it more articulate, so I guess I'll abandon it and talk some more about parties. Kidding, I am not talking about parties anymore today (except to repeat one more time to come to ours from 5 to 8 pm at Pachanga.)
Here are some other things worth reading today: (and FYI, sorry for all the spelling mistakes; my blogger spell check isn't working right now and I'm too lazy to check them manually).
David Corn's writing on the Rove stuff is good, particularly if you're obsessed with it. Also there are fun liberal ads on the site.
This In These Times story about The Downing Street Memo and how it was ignored in the mainstream media is interesting. Well, it's been ignored in the alt.media too. We haven't done anything about it, although I've been part of an online list-serv of alt editors discussing possible ways to cover it. Should we?
This Weekly Dig story about Tegan and Sara Yes, that's right, about a music group, but I like them a lot. SFR music writerJonanna Widner, also writing for Pop Matters, turned me onto them. I feel like Wake Up Exhausted
is becoming my personal anthem.
I keep meaning to mention Jim Baca's post about meeting W and now I have!
I thought Zmag's article about US conscientious objectors in Canada was really interesting. You hardly ever hear about this. I went to Vancouver last summer actually and if one were going to expat, it would be a very pleasant place to be. Everyone was really, really nice—of course, I'm not sure a clean, vibrant city where everybody is really nice is quite the appropo environment for me at this point.
Dooce continues to crack me up. That's one funny lady.
I am taking a deep breath.
OK, as I was saying. Slate has an interesting article today about the rivalry between LANL and Livermore
I mentioned, the other day, that Greg Mello and David Bacon had stopped by to talk about LANL and also to make sure I had the press materials for their July 15 event on writers addressing the nuclear age which looks very interesting. One thing I think is that on the one hand, yes, it's a good time for anti-nuke activists to put some heat on the nation's nuclear policy, particularly given all the problems LANL has had. And yet, and maybe I'm wrong, there is this weird disconnect where I don't really get the sense that most people are too worked up over LANL over nuclear issues right now. Maybe it's because liberals who would be worked up over it are busy being worked up over the war and George W., or maybe it's just because it's hard to focus on something you might want to change when it's been the same for so long. Well, there will clearly be changes for LANL down the road, it's just a question of who will manage it and what direction that will take. I've been told, by some, that morale isn't good at the lab (which wouldn't be shocking; I'm sure working somewhere that's been relatively villified must be challenging at times, particularly given that so many people who work there work hard and are very smart and, in most cases, are doing work they believe in, not trying to destroy the universe. I think this is the problem with societal/political issues once they are vernacularly entrenched. It's hard to remember there are people involved and thus, theoretically at least, the potential for change. Or something like that. This is also the problem, I would imagine, with working for the government, something I've thus far avoided).
OK, that parenthetical statement got me really off course and I've just reread it 5 times and can't figure out how to make it more articulate, so I guess I'll abandon it and talk some more about parties. Kidding, I am not talking about parties anymore today (except to repeat one more time to come to ours from 5 to 8 pm at Pachanga.)
Here are some other things worth reading today: (and FYI, sorry for all the spelling mistakes; my blogger spell check isn't working right now and I'm too lazy to check them manually).
David Corn's writing on the Rove stuff is good, particularly if you're obsessed with it. Also there are fun liberal ads on the site.
This In These Times story about The Downing Street Memo and how it was ignored in the mainstream media is interesting. Well, it's been ignored in the alt.media too. We haven't done anything about it, although I've been part of an online list-serv of alt editors discussing possible ways to cover it. Should we?
This Weekly Dig story about Tegan and Sara Yes, that's right, about a music group, but I like them a lot. SFR music writerJonanna Widner, also writing for Pop Matters, turned me onto them. I feel like Wake Up Exhausted
is becoming my personal anthem.I keep meaning to mention Jim Baca's post about meeting W and now I have!
I thought Zmag's article about US conscientious objectors in Canada was really interesting. You hardly ever hear about this. I went to Vancouver last summer actually and if one were going to expat, it would be a very pleasant place to be. Everyone was really, really nice—of course, I'm not sure a clean, vibrant city where everybody is really nice is quite the appropo environment for me at this point.
Dooce continues to crack me up. That's one funny lady.
posted by Julia at 2:12 PM
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